In less than 10 days after full-scale operations of the registration and stamps (R&S) department began, the Telangana government has earned Rs 78 crore, logging over 28,000 property registration transactions since May 8.
The revival of property registrations has given hope to the real estate sector gasping due to the lockdown and spiralling cement and steel prices.
The state government had set a target of Rs 10,000 crore to the R&S department for the 2020-21 financial year and it has realised Rs 91 crore so far. R&S department joint inspector general Vemula Srinivasulu said the number of registrations has picked up and currently they were recording half the number of transactions that were done before Covid-19-triggered lockdown came into force.
Officials of the R&S department claim the actual scenario would be known only after a month as currently old agreements, which happened earlier and only registration was pending, were being done.
“Usually, over 6,000 documents used to be registered every day before Covid-19. Currently, we are doing between 3,000 and 3,500 documents. The R&S department used to earn revenue of Rs 25 crore per day earlier. Now, it is hovering around Rs 10 crore to Rs 13 crore per day. These transactions could be agreements done before lockdown came into force and want to register to avoid any legal complications. If we watch out for one more month, we will know the scenario of the real estate sector as most registrations would be of current transactions,” Srinivasulu told TOI.
“We are hoping the registrations will pick up. People initially invested in gold as stock markets crashed as land is not an easy commodity to liquidate,” he added.
“In the pre-Covid era, we used to collect Rs 600 crore revenue per month. In the last financial year, wea earned revenue of around Rs 7,200 crore. We have been carrying out minimum operations, but full-scale operations resumed after May 8,” R&S department additional IG Movva Rajesh told TOI.
Meanwhile, realtors have been demanding the Centre and the state government to revive construction activity.
Telangana Real Estate Developers’ Association executive vice-president Meka Vijay Sai said: “The real estate sector will witness a slowdown due to the lockdown impact initially. Projects nearing completion have no problem. Cement prices have increased sharply from Rs 220 to Rs 400 per bag. The government should help both buyers and developers. Buyers should get interest concession (till March of this financial year) and GST concession as well.”
