Central SVAMITVA Scheme to Provide Property Cards for Every House Owners

Verifying the ownership of land is one of the most challenging tasks in India. When more than one person lays claim to a single piece of property, this leads to a lot of land disputes. The Revenue Department is responsible for maintaining land records, but the records are not updated due to inconsistencies and remain inaccurate for years.

Most land in India is owned by farmers, but since they do not have formal land titles, they can not use it as collateral. This leads them to borrow loans from informal lenders at higher rates who eventually grab their property.

Introduction of SVAMITVA Scheme

The physical distribution of property cards under a scheme of SVAMITVA was initiated recently by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. These are Aadhaar-like cards issued in villages to property owners that will assist farmers to use the land as collateral. This would pave the way for villagers to utilise the property as a financial asset to take out loans and take advantage of other financial benefits.

What is SVAMITVA Scheme?

SVAMITVA is the Panchayati Raj Ministry's Central Sector System, initiated by the Prime Minister on National Panchayati Raj Day on 24 April 2020. The scheme is intended to provide household owners in rural areas with the record of rights and issue property cards.

The scheme is being introduced for a period of four years (2020-2024) in a phased manner throughout the Country. Eventually, it would cover around the country's 6.62 lakh villages. Rohit Gera, Managing Director of Gera Developments Private Limited, said that this scheme is a welcome move to give land ownership papers to farmers.

Home and property is an intensely emotional subject and providing property owners with access to ownership records offers a significant sense of self-worth. As village documents are not always updated and properly maintained, this would also make transactions simpler, leading to depreciation of the property in case of sale.

SVAMITVA Beneficiaries

Around one lakh property holders have been able to download their property cards through an SMS link using the scheme. The physical distribution of the cards will implement by the respective state governments.

The beneficiaries are from 763 villages in six states, including 346 in Uttar Pradesh, 221 in Haryana, 100 in Maharashtra, 44 in Madhya Pradesh, 50 in Uttarakhand, and 2 in Karnataka. The physical copies of the Property Cards will be issued by beneficiaries from all these states except Maharashtra within one day. Maharashtra has a mechanism for recovering a property card's nominal cost, so it's going to take a month.

During the launch video conference, PM Modi said, the legal papers of their homes have been handed over to one lakh beneficiaries from Haryana, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Uttarakhand and Uttar Pradesh and such property cards will be issued to every household in every village of the country over the next three-four years.

Scheme's Framework

The Panchayati Raj Ministry, state revenue departments and the India Survey are working together to restrict areas in villages and use drones to create land records.

So far, six states have signed the MoU for drone surveys of rural areas and introduction of the scheme with the Survey of India. These states finalised the digital Property Card format and the villages to be covered for the drone-based survey. The Punjab and Rajasthan States have signed an MoU for the establishment of a Continuous Operating Reference System (CORS) network with the Survey of India to assist in future drone flying activities.

Property Cards in the Different States

For property cards, the various states property cards with different terminologies.

  • Rural Property Ownership Records (RPOR) in Karnataka
  • Adhikar Abhilekh in Madhya Pradesh
  • Sannad in Maharashtra
  • Svamitva Abhilekh in Uttarakhand 
  • Gharauni in Uttar Pradesh
  • Title Deed in Haryana

Price Appreciation

As banks will offer loans that will prevent shady real estate deals where one plot is sold to many buyers and registrations are not carried out, this scheme is also likely to show a rise in land prices. Most of the cheaper land is sold informally without proper government approval and legal ownership guarantee.

Although the framework looks promising, dispute-related problems and how states can check all land records are still a difficult task.

By: Shailaja K