Sub-registrar offices to receive POS devices

According to a recent department circular issued by Inspector general of registration J Kumaragurubaran, cost for stamp duties and other charges more than Rs 1,000 to Rs 5,000 should only be made using demand draft, while for payment of more than Rs 5,000, online payment options could be used. Kumaragurubaran has approved of cash payments only to transactions less than Rs 1,000 at sub-registrar offices.

The department has made arrangement to conduct a training session on the use of POS devices for technical staff of sub-registrar offices on Monday. “Once the POS devices are distributed to the sub-registrar offices, the applicants can even make payments less than Rs 1,000 by using credit and debit cards. State Bank of India is assisting in implementing the new system,” Kumaragurubaran said.

A department source said that the POS devices would be distributed to the sub-registrar offices from Tuesday. “The cashless system is implemented as a part of Star 2.0 project which makes the registration process online and this would prevent corruption inside the sub-registrar offices as there would be no cash transaction,” the source added.

Meanwhile, the department has issued more than 1 lakh QR Code embedded encumbrance certificates (EC). “As of January 25, as many as 1,23,855 online applications were received seeking ECs. Of which, 1,05,937 online encumbrance certificates have been generated,” Kumaragurubaran said.

It may be noted that Registration Department introduced e-payment mode of paying registration charges, as an additional option for offline payment in 2015. “We have also introduced e-stamping to curb misappropriation such as fake stamp papers in May 2010. Initially, the e-stamping was implemented on a pilot basis at nine sub-registrar offices in Chennai. Later the scheme was expanded to 119 offices in the state,” Kumaragurubaran added. He said, POS devices would help the applicants in avoiding multiple trips to banks and registrar offices.