To ease monetisation of rural properties, the government may provide property titles to 40 million rural families across 3.46 lakh villages across 31 states and union territories by the end of FY26.
The exercise will be carried out under the central scheme – Survey of Villages Abadi and Mapping with Improvised Technology in Village Areas (Svamitva).
The centre sector scheme is currently being implemented by panchayati raj ministry in collaboration with state revenue and panchayati raj departments and survey of India has so far provided property titles to over 2.25 crore people in 1.59 lakh villages.
Officials said the scheme launched in 2020 aims to provide land titles or record of rights to all the rural households which would facilitate monetization of properties and enable bank loans, reducing disputes over ownership and support village level planning.
The survey works using drones for generating high-resolution maps of property parcels, has been completed in 3,17,000 villages.
The area surveyed over 3 lakh villages under the Svamitva of 67,000 sq.km has an intrinsic value of over Rs 132 lakh crore, according to an official note.
“We aim to provide property rights titles to 4 crore people by the end of next fiscal for which about 92% of survey works have been completed,” an official told FE. The drone surveys across all the states covered under the scheme would be completed by the end of March, 2025 and the property cards preparations to be completed across all the states by end of next fiscal.
Key states which have generated property cards include Uttar Pradesh (1.01 crore), Madhya Pradesh (39.94 lakh), Haryana (25.15 lakh), Gujarat (12.25 lakh) and Karnataka (10 lakh). However the scheme does not cover tribal regions or panchayats extension to scheduled areas (PESA) as in several of these regions lands are jointly owned by communities.
In the absence of land titles, selling and buying of properties were initiated using power of attorney which was not recognised as valid documents by the financial institutions.
The focus of the programme is to demarcate Abadi or inhabited land followed by large scale mapping of villages through usage of drones and subsequently ground verification of maps by the revenue officials.
The scheme has provision for disposal of claims and objections against the maps. The validation of maps based on the surveys are initiated through approval of gram sabha in respective villages, officials said.
So far property title cards to all inhabited villages of Haryana, Uttarakhand, Puducherry, Tripura, Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Goa and Tripura have been generated.
Several including Bihar, West Bengal, Tamil Nadu and Telangana who have not implemented the scheme have stated that land records have been generated earlier through state specific schemes or availability of pre-existing records
Officials acknowledged that for decades, the survey and settlement of rural land had remained incomplete, with many states especially northern and western regions failing to map or document inhabited areas of villages. “This lack of legal records left property owners in these areas without formal records effectively barring them from accessing institutional credit to upgrade their homes or use their property as a financial asset for loans,”.
The funds under the scheme are provided to Survey of India for large scale mapping using drones and establishing continuous operating reference stations for states and union territories.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi last week had stated property value worth Rs 100 lakh crore has been unlocked in rural areas of the country under Svamitva scheme.