Andhra Pradesh government to video record property registrations

Amaravati: The AP government will soon launch a pilot project for property registrations in the state. Stating that all registrations under the project would be video recorded, officials said that this is a new move to put an end to benami transactions. This would also help cleanse the registration offices from corruption as they would be under surveillance.

The pilot project would be initially implemented in 20 registrar and sub-registrar offices in Visakhapatnam, Vizianagaram, Vijayawada, Rajamahendravaram, Kakinada, Eluru, Tirupati, Guntur, Nellore, Kadapa and Kurnool in the next few weeks.

Each office will be equipped with three video cameras and other essential accessories. "We will keep a tab on the activities inside the registration offices using the system. The central monitoring system would enable the department heads to keep a close watch on the happenings in the offices in real-time," the officials said.

This would be the first of its kind experiment in the country, the officials claimed. So far only photographs of the buyers and sellers were being used for registrations. Special Chief Secretary (Revenue) Rajat Bhargava said the project was part of the Good Governance initiative of the government.

Commissioner and Inspector General of Registration and Stamps Siddharth Jain said the video recording will prevent fraudulent registration of properties and check impersonation using forged identities. "We will offer video recording of the transactions to buyers and sellers that will serve as evidence and a second layer of protection," he said.

The project would subsequently be extended to all registration offices in the next phase upon successful completion of the pilot phase.