Though Covid-19 pandemic and subsequent lockdown badly hit revenue of the state, the registration and stamps (R&S) department is bouncing back.
The state government has earned nearly Rs 2,000 crore in just two and half months through property registrations. In January alone, the registration department had earned Rs 950 crore. However, the major revenue-earning department may not achieve its target of Rs 8,000 crore this fiscal.
The state government gets major revenue (state own tax revenue) from registration and stamps department, commercial taxes and excise departments. However, due to the lockdown, the registration offices were shut and later also there was no property transactions.
Since September, 2020 onwards, the state government had declared registration holiday for nearly two and half months to ensure registration of both agriculture and non-agriculture properties through Dharani portal. As there were legal hitches, the state government could go ahead with agriculture property registrations through Dharani by revenue department, while the old system is being followed for non-agriculture property registrations from December 14, 2020. “Since December 14, about 3.10 lakh non-agriculture property documents were registered, which fetched Rs 1,950 crore to the department. While the revenue was Rs 950 crore in January, it was about Rs 640 crore in February 2021,” a top official of the registration and stamps department told.
Of the Rs 2,000 crore revenue generated since December, 2020, nearly Rs 1,200 crore came from real estate hubs Hyderabad, Rangareddy, Medchal-Malkajgiri and Sangareddy districts, official sources said. After reopening sub-registrar offices with full capacity, the department’s revenue was less than 50% of its normal daily revenue.
“Our department revenue target is about Rs 8,000 crore for the 2020-2021 fiscal. But the department may end up getting about Rs 5,500 crore by the end of this financial year. We expected about Rs 10,000 crore initially for 2020-2021 with an intention to increase land values. But the idea was dropped due to the the impact of lockdown,” a senior official in CMO said.
