How to surrender additional PAN card and what are the consequences
If you have more than one PAN, whether acquired intentionally or inadvertently, you run the risk of being penalised. Following government's mandate to link PAN with Aadhaar, and Aadhaar with bank accounts, detecting multiple PANs could become easier for the Income Tax Department once the data is collated. As per Section 139A of Income Tax Act, 1961 a person can hold only one PAN. This section deals with the eligibility to apply for PAN, when an individual is supposed to quote it and so on. The seventh provision of this section states, "No person who has already been allotted a permanent account number under the new series shall apply, obtain or possess another permanent account number." As per the Section 272B of the Income Tax Act, the income tax officer can levy a penalty of Rs 10,000 on a person for having more than one PAN. Explaining Section 272B in detail, Shalini Jain, Tax Partner, EY says "penalty under Section 272B is not specific, but discretionary. It says if a person fails to comply with the provisions of section 139A, the Assessing Officer may direct that such person shall pay, by way of penalty, a sum of ten thousand rupees. This means, a person who is eligible to apply for a PAN and doesn't have it, or a person who is intentionally not quoting it while corresponding with the Income Tax Authority, and a person who has multiple PANs can be slapped with a fine of Rs 10,000. The section further says that the defaulter will be given an opportunity of being heard to explain to the Accessing Officer (AO) that it is an unintentional mistake." There can be genuine cases, where individuals have been inadvertently allotted more than one PAN, says Jain. "NRIs come to India for business and apply for a PAN. When they revisit India again after 5 or 10 years, unintentionally, they may end up applying of PAN again," she explains. For instance, if an individual loses his PAN card and wants it to be reissued, but the address is different from the one provided at the time when PAN was if by any chance, you have more than one PAN, you should surrender it and there's a prescribed procedure to do that. This can be done online as well as offline by filling out PAN correction form.
Source - The Economic Times