MUMBAI: To boost sales and unlock land tied up as enemy property, the Maharashtra cabinet on Tuesday approved a decision to waive off stamp duty on the sale and purchase of such properties in the state.
According to the cabinet, the waiver will apply at the time of registration and will be limited to the first sale and purchase of enemy properties. At present, the state levies a six per cent stamp duty on the total cost of a property.
Maharashtra chief minister Devendra Fadnavis chaired the cabinet meeting where this decision was taken.
Maharashtra has a total of 428 enemy properties, most of them located in Mumbai, including 62 in South Mumbai and 177 in the suburbs. Of the remaining properties, 86 are in Thane, 77 in Palghar, 11 in Ratnagiri, four in Pune, two each in Sambhaji Nagar and Jalna, and one in Sindhudurg district. These properties belong to citizens who left India and migrated to enemy countries during the war.
The Union Home Department’s Custodian of Enemy Property of India (CEPI), which preserves, manages and sells enemy properties. According to the Enemy Property Act, 1968, the Custodian of Enemy Property can be sold and purchased as well. The auctions are conducted time to time of these enemy properties.
However, it has noticed that the auctions of these enemy properties are getting less response. “If the stamp duty is waived off at the time of first registration of the property after issuance of the sale certificate by the sale of enemy properties in India (SEPI), the cost of purchasing enemy property will be reduced. And people may show a positive response to buy these several-year-old locked properties there. Therefore, a proposal was submitted to the state Revenue Department by the SEPI to waive stamp duty on the purchase and sale of such properties,” said the cabinet note.