Anywhere property registration facility a one-City wonder

The anywhere property registration facility, which helped check the menace of bribe in sub-registrar offices across Bangalore, is not being extended to rest of the State as planned, due to intense lobbying, it is learnt.

The State government is understood to have directed the Stamps and Registration department not to go ahead with the extension of the facility outside Bangalore. “We have no plans to extend the facility outside Bangalore,” Inspector General of Registration and Commissioner of Stamps Adoni Syed Saleem said, without giving reasons.

According to sources, strong lobbying by department officials against extension of the facility,  managed to have their way. Ever since the launch of the facility in November last year, it had helped control corruption, or collecting bribe for property transactions, to a considerable extent in 43 sub-registrar offices of Bangalore urban district.

Under the facility, people are free to register property in any sub-registrar office within the Registration District. Bangalore has five Registration Districts — Basavanagudi, Gandhinagar, Jayanagar, Rajajinagar and Shivajinagar — each comprising eight to nine sub-registrar offices. After the launch of the facility, people had started registering property in offices with least hurdles, sources said.

But outside Bangalore, people have no choice but to register their property in the jurisdictional sub-registrar office. At many of these offices, the staff refuse to register properties raising minor objections. Until palms are greased, papers don’t move, sources said.

The then chief minister D V Sadananda Gowda, who launched the anywhere registration facility, had promised to extend it to rest of the State in six months. He had also said steps will be taken to connect all sub-registrar offices, enabling property registration anywhere in the state.

That would require amendment to the Registration Act, 1908, a Central Act, which the State government intended taking up with the Centre.

Change of hardware

The department had proposed overhauling the hardware at all 203 sub-registrar offices in the State, to extend the facility. After long delay, the department has recently cleared Rs 147 crore tender to change the hardware. The tender has been awarded to HCL Technologies.

Besides, the software that enables implementation of anywhere registration facility will also be installed. But it is not being used for extending the anywhere facility.

The change in hardware and software will be utilised for issuing Encumberance Certificates (EC) in any sub-registrar office, official sources said.

* Govt not to implement anywhere property registration outside Bangalore.
* Facility available in Bangalore since November last year.
* The facility helped control corruption in 43 sub-registrar offices across Bangalore.
* Anywhere EC to become a reality soon across the State.