The income tax department has been is working on a processing centre for the allotment of e-PAN on a real-time basis. It has also initiated or proposed to initiate projects to further improve the technology backbone of the department, the parliament was informed.

In a written reply to the Parliament on Monday, Minister of State for Finance Anurag Thakur said, "Real time PAN/TAN Processing Centre (RTPC) is being contemplated for future with the objective of allotment of e-PAN through Aadhaar based e-KYC on near to real time basis (in less than 10 minutes)."

The real-time PAN-TAN centres will reduce the time required to allot PAN, particularly for the applicant's applying through 'Aadhaar-based e-KYC' route after an upgradation in the allotment processes and infrastructure.

Tax Deduction and Collection Account number (TAN) is a 10-digit alphanumeric number which every tax deductor is required to quote while making any tax payment to the Central Government.

Permanent Account Number (PAN) is a 10-digit alphanumeric code issued by the I-T department to uniquely identify tax payers.

The IT department is also working on 'Project Insight,' an integrated data warehousing and business intelligence platform which is being rolled out in phased manner as it aims to strengthen non-intrusive information driven approach for improving compliance.

Further, the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) has directed that assessment proceedings are to be compulsorily conducted electronically through 'e-proceeding' during 2018-19 in all type of cases barring a few exceptions.