With the High Court recently specifying that the restriction on registering unapproved properties was not a blanket ban, but only excluded certain categories of land classification, property owners are now pinning their hopes on their land falling within the right classification. Lakhs of people, who have purchased panchayat-approved property all over Tamil Nadu, remain unable to register them in the wake of the September 9 order of the Madras High Court.
When the matter came up for hearing in the Madras High Court on October 21, it was submitted that a day earlier, Section 22-A of the Registration (Tamil Nadu Amendment) Act, 2008, was notified through a government order (G.O. Ms. No. 123) of Commercial Taxes and Registration Department. It aims at preventing registration of lands converted as house sites without approval from appropriate planning authorities. However, those plots classified as housing sites anywhere in the land records could be registered. People at the grassroots of the real estate business say the notification is unlikely to be a major turnaround for the market. “The earnings of the Registration Department have been seriously affected. Only plots approved by the Directorate of Town and Country Planning are being registered now,” says a mediator in a southern suburb. According to him, even transfer of agriculture land as such is not taking place currently.
According to a legal expert, reports of passing of the G.O. last week brought some hopes among the real estate fraternity, but this was short lived as it was only a notification of the Amendment carried out in 2008. “The G.O. only reinforces the fact that agriculture property cannot be misused and that unapproved property cannot be registered,” he reiterated. If your property does not fall within these classifications, or involves change of land classification, it is likely that it will not be registered.
