The government has decided to issue biometric PAN cards to taxpayers across the country to weed out the problem of duplicate and fake ones.

The decision was taken recently by the Finance Ministry and it comes in the wake of a Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) report that asked the Income Tax department to ensure that a single tax payer is not issued multiple cards.

The proposed new biometric Permanent Account Number (PAN) cards would bear the I-T assessee' fingerprints (two from each hand) and the face.

There could be an option to existing PAN card holders to opt for the biometric cards, but it may not be mandatory, a senior official in the I-T department said.