HYDERABAD: In its interim orders on Monday, the Telangana High Court has set aside implementation of GO 84, dated July 26, 2023, regularising property registrations through notary/unregistered documents.
A bench of Chief Justice Alok Aradhe and Justice NV Shravan Kumar held that GO 84 prima facie falls outside the scope of Section 9 of the Indian Stamp Act, 1899, as it attempts to regularise notarised documents related to non-agricultural urban properties in the State and directs authorities to treat them as valid link documents.
The petitioners had argued that the GO has the effect of overriding statutory provisions, including those found in the Transfer of Property Act-1882, the Registration Act, 1908, and the Indian Stamp Act, 1899.
They also contended that the regularisation of transactions based on plot size, as prescribed in the GO, lacks an intelligible difference compared to verifiable economic criteria. It was argued that this GO could lead to further litigation.
SGP Harender Pershad argued that the intention behind GO 84 was not to register documents prohibited by the Registration Act, 1908, but to collect stamp duty on notarised documents, a power vested in the State government under Section 9 of the Indian Stamp Act, 1899.