Karnataka government's property ownership project may be junked

An ambitious project of the state government to make urban property ownership records (UPOR) mandatory in property transactions faces the threat of being junked if a recent government decision is anything to go by. The revenue department had taken up the project on a pilot basis in Shivamogga and Mangaluru cities, where the government made UPOR a critical requirement in property transactions. The Survey, Settlement & Land Records, an arm of the revenue department, set the ball rolling on this crucial reform seven years ago in a bid to clean up property records and digitise them so that there is little or no scope for fraud and encroachment of government land. If implemented well, it would also bring down civil litigations as most of them are related to title. The project involved surveying and mapping government and private properties in urban areas, verifying documents, hearing objections and issuing UPOR cards to property owners with guarantee of land ownership. Since land ownership records in India are presumptive in nature, the government had said UPOR could become the only conclusive document of ownership.