NEW DELHI: Confederation of Real Estate Developers’ Associations of India (CREDAI Bengaluru), submitted a letter highlighting critical issues in the real estate sector with a particular focus on concerns related to e-khata to Krishna Byre Gowda, revenue minister, Karnataka.
The same document was also submitted to Munish Moudgil, special commissioner (Revenue), Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP).
The CREDAI Bengaluru delegation made a parallel submission to Gowda and Dayananda, inspector general of registration and commissioner of stamps, requesting the reinstatement of the previous cap of Rs 10 lakh on stamp duty for both title deed deposit agreements and mortgage deeds.
Amar Mysore, president of CREDAI Bengaluru said, The sudden implementation of mandatory e-khata has resulted in a rush of applications and subsequent overflow of applications from the general public, causing significant distress to people who are in the process of getting their documents registered. Also, the recent increase in stamp duty rates implemented disproportionately has affected the real estate sector. For instance, a MoDT for a construction finance loan of Rs 100 crore incurs a stamp duty of Rs 50 lakhs compared to the previous cap of Rs 10 lakh.”
He also mentioned that the current process of uploading documents for e-khata and the document verification process adopted by BBMP is time-consuming and cumbersome, effectively delaying the registration process of various documents.
CREDAI Bengaluru has requested the implementation of the mandatory requirement for e-khata in a phased manner to ensure smooth operations, as all e-khata across Bengaluru urban limits are still in the process of being updated/uploaded in the e-aasthi portal.
The industry body also expressed concern about how the new system affects stamp duty calculations for undeveloped land. With the insistence on e-Khata, undeveloped lands are now being wrongly valued based on price per square foot, instead of the previous method of valuing by the acre.
CREDAI Bengaluru suggested the streamlining the issuance of the e-khata document, enhancing portal capabilities for multiple transactions, accepting alternative identity proofs, mandating e-khata only for title transfers and reverting to the previous mechanism for undeveloped land, reducing stamp duty fees for deposit of title deeds.
