Land sales fall due to elections in Karimnagar

Karimnagar: With people afraid of carrying cash during election time, there is a drastic decline in land sales in Karimnagar district.

The general elections have adversely affected the District Stamps and Registration Department.

The otherwise busy office is now looking almost empty as almost all the staff including sub-registrar, document writers and others are busy with election-related work. If election duty is one reason, another and major one is police and revenue departments' checking carrying of cash ahead of the elections on April 11.

Several check posts were set up on all main roads and vehicles and houses of leaders of various parties were being checked. Even the bank transactions of bank accounts were under scrutiny and were put on hold.

Police surveillance teams will book cases against people, who are found carrying cash more than Rs 50,000 and fail to show valid documents about the source of money, under preventive sections of the Criminal Procedure Code to ensure free, fair and transparent elections.

If there are no valid papers for the cash, then it will be handed over to Income Tax Department, which will take charge of the cash and will conduct requisite proceedings to check if the cash is accounted for.

If not, the department will deduct tax and penalties, if any, from the amount and will return the remaining amount to whom it was confiscated from.

Under this situation, people are feeling insecure to carry cash afraid of their cash might be seized by police or revenue officials. Thus, both sales and purchases of land came to a temporary halt. Land registrations were affected since the election schedule released on March 10. All real estate transactions have been postponed till the elections conclude.

Usually more than 100 registrations are made per day at the sub-registrar offices in Karimnagar, but now only 10 to 30 documents are coming per day.

Earlier Karimnagar district has 17 sub-registrar offices. During 2017-18 financial year, the office has earned Rs 153 crores revenue through registrations. The revenue target for 2018-19 financial year was Rs 132.31 crores and earned Rs 141.15 crores.

Land registrations were declined since the election code was introduced on March 10 and due to the Assembly elections in October-November last year.

The revenue target for March 2019 is Rs 14.70 crores, but only Rs 9.45 crores was received this month. As many as 14,395 documents were registered and Rs 21.38 crores revenue was received in last March.

Stamps and Registration Department, which is moving ahead by securing revenue target each month, has suffered staggering conditions in the last month of this financial year.

Speaking with The Hans India, District Registrar G Prasuna said that they secured 106% revenue in the last financial year.

Against a targeted revenue of Rs 132.31 crores, the department received Rs 141.15 crores. But in the present financial year, due to elections the documentation has been reduced drastically.

In November last and March months, land registrations have been postponed due to restrictions on carrying cash due to elections, she explained.