By K. Sukumaran
Source: https://www.thehindu.com The Hindu dated Jul 23, 2016
Even after almost seven decades of independence, land/property titling is multidimensional and to some extent confusing. A Draft Land Titling Bill prepared in 2010, revised in 2011 and circulated for public comments, was an attempt to standardise the titling records. It is now learnt that the Union Rural Development Ministry (Department of Land Reforms) is revising the old Bill with improvements to suit today’s needs and the Law Ministry is vetting it. The new Bill is expected to cover bestowing of clear title to owners, not
merely a sale deed
The proposed project will be covering about 130 districts in the first stage in selected areas
Editor’s comments: In the last four decades or more, several pilot projects were undertaken by State and Central governments. Every project was a success technically with cost of creating survey records being quite low. One of the latest under BhuBharati, Nizamabad project was completed ( 6000 acres ) in 2008 at a cost of Rs 100 to 200 per acre; cost of land being lakhs of rupees per acre.
In Australia, USA and many other countries, registration of property gives TITLE to the buyer. If it is legally challenged and the petitioner wins the case, government pays compensation. Such cases are rare. In India, though government charges high stamp duty at registration, they don’t take responsibility for awarding title to buyer. Telangana and some other governments are seriously working towards a system which ensures TITLE with registration.
The above news about land title doesn’t speak about earlier announcements. India needs an effective system to deal with announcements not implemented. Readers are welcome to inform about such cases where announcements made but not implemented.