Government relaxes patta norms for flat sale

BHUBANESWAR: Ending the six-month deadlock over transaction of flats, the state government on Friday relaxed registration norms for apartments during purchase. From now on, record of rights (ROR), called patta in local parlance, would not be a prerequisite.
Additional chief secretary (revenue) Taradatt wrote to the inspector general of registration and district collectors, asking them to allow registration of apartments if a developer produces ROR of any previous owner of the land even if the property changed multiple hands.
Conceding that insistence on updated ROR of the transferor was creating difficulties, Taradatt said, "RORs of the original owners and intermittent registered deeds would be considered."
Sale of apartments had almost come to a standstill after the government implemented Registration (Odisha) Amendment Act, 2013, and made updated ROR mandatory for registration of any immovable property from April 25. The registering officers declined to register apartments if developers didn't possess pattas in their names. Since many developers construct apartments with power of attorney, only a few possess pattas. Even in case of purchased land, developers can't produce patta easily as mutation, the process to create pattas, takes long , sources said.
Real estate developers have welcomed the decision. "We took the issue with the government on several occasions. Insistence on ROR had almost stopped sale of flats. People were apprehensive about investing in apartments as without ROR they won't be able to resell them if need be," said president of Association for Odisha Realestate Developers Umesh Patnaik.