Chennai: In a move aimed at curbing fraudulent and benami property transactions, the Tamil Nadu Registration Department is all set to introduce biometric fingerprinting and digital photographing for registering documents at all its 573 sub-registrar offices.
The technology-enabled system, for which the Registration Act has been amended, is expected to be implemented from February next year. This would replace the existing three-year old practice of manually affixing passport-sized photographs and inked left hand thumb impressions of property vendors and buyers on the second page of registered property documents. “We have placed orders with Electronics Corporation of Tamil Nadu (ELCOT) for acquiring 1,200 biometric finger print devices and an equal number of digital cameras, which would be installed at the subregistrar offices (two devices of each in every office) for which the state government has sanctioned Rs 55 lakh. Once the equipment is in place, every property seller and buyer will be digitally photographed and their left hand thumb impressions will be recorded on the biometric device against their photographs. The procedure will be over in less than 5 minutes, unlike the present system which takes time,” R Sivakumar, inspector-general of registration (Tamil Nadu) told The Times of India on Wednesday.
The digital thumb impressions and photographs will be annexed to the registered property documents and later fed into a computer server, which can be retrieved at the click of the mouse or keyboard.
Presently, the documents containing the manually inked thumb impressions and photographs are scanned and stored in the computers in the respective sub registrar offices.
Also, the digital camera will capture the image of the vendors and buyers in high resolution and is tamper-proof. “Currently, on a day when there is large number of property transactions waiting to be registered, the sub registrar is unable to verify if the photograph affixed on the document is that of the person who is present. These problems will be eliminated in the new system,” Sivakumar added.
ENTERING CYBERSPACE
Until now, whenever the police sought the help of the registration department in property related frauds, it was tedious to get the info
But new system, which has been tested at the Mylapore sub-registrar’s office, will electronically transmit the info to the police
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