Telangana High Court gives nod for commencing registration of non-agri properties

Hyderabad: The High Court bench headed by Chief Justice Raghavendra Singh Chauhan and Justice Bollam Vijaysen Reddy on Thursday heard the batch of seven public interest litigations and writ plea against the Dharani portal opposing the Telangana government's move of digitalising the entire agriculture and non- agriculture lands on the ground that the Dharani portal work was not backed by a law or statute. The CJ bench clarified that there was no stay accorded by the court on registrations. However, the only stay was on to not to insist people to divulge their Aadhaar and caste details while uploading data on the said portal. The court permitted the State government to register the documents dealing with the non- agricultural lands in compliance with Section 70A to 70C of the Registration Act, 1908 in the Computer Aided Administration of Registration (CARD) format.

Moreover, the State government has been permitted to direct the people to register for a slot and only thereafter to register the documents. Any person who does not possess the Property Tax Identification Number (PTIN) should be provided with the PTIN number within a period of two days and the registrations should be taken up thereafter.

It can be recalled that the State government had put on hold the registrations of the non-agriculture properties since September 7 as this issue has been subjudice in the High Court and the Advocate General requested the court to issue a clarification and permit the government to go ahead with the registrations.

Senior Counsel Desai Prakash Reddy appearing for one of the petitioners, I Gopal Sharma, opposed the State government stalling the registrations stating that when the court had not stayed the registrations, how can the State do?

The Chief Justice stated that the government was of the opinion for whatever reasons that there was a stay on the registrations, unless the court issues a clarification, the registrations cannot commence. Advocate General Banda Shivananda Prasad urged the court to issue a clarification or rather permit the government to go ahead with the registration of the non-agriculture properties and assured the court, by giving an undertaking, that no person would be insisted upon to give his Aadhaar and caste details nor the details of the family members and assured the court that the registrations would be taken up through CARD. The court adjourned the batch of PILs and writ pleas to December 16 and directed the State government to file its counter affidavits by December 14.