People find online property registration ‘more tedious’

Tribune News Service

Ludhiana, July 6

To bring transparency and convenience for citizens, online registration of property started in the district from June 22.

The age-old property registration system has been replaced by online system, which allows Aadhaar-based verification for the process. While many feel that the system is “more tedious and cumbersome process” as at times people face problem in uploading their documents due to disconncetivity of connection, they get a waiting of at least one week and one needs to depend on deed writers etc, however, officials of the District Revenue Department maintain that there could be initial hiccups, but the system will benefit the masses.

One of the staff members in East (Transport Nagar) office, on condition of anonymity, said many uneducated people were not even aware of the new system.

“They approached the deed writers for helping them in seeking an appointment for registry as they were not technically sound. Many were misguided by the deed writers. Though, there is no provision of any penalty clause if a person fails to reach on time, but visitors are told that the fine will be levied if for any reason registry is not done on the appointment day. In case of an emergency too, they will have to wait for a week,” he said.

He said earlier up to 200 registries were done at the East office, but now around 80 to 90 registries were done each day.

He said due to the decrease in the number of registries, the government had also suffered revenue loss.

When asked that the online system was brought by the government to bring transparency, the staff member said: “You can do little to curb corruption here.”

It may be mentioned here that the new Property Registration System has been implemented keeping in mind the cyber security and to keep a check on fraudulent deals.

Citizens cannot be misguided on collector rates, various exemptions etc. They can book an appointment for land registration sitting at their homes through the website www.igrpunjab.gov.in.

Satnam Singh, a senior citizen, said: “How can you expect me to work on a computer to know all details about the online registration? We depend on deed writer or an advocate, who can guide as well as misguide us.”

While the state government wants to bring transparency in the system, the deed writers are “exploiting” the innocent visitors. Deed writers charge up to Rs 2,500 for getting one online appointment for property registeration of a person.

DRO Savita Singh said it was bad if people were fleecing citizens like this.

She said the department would check the issue and bring it to the notice of higher ups.