Bhu-Aadhaar and digitisation of land records

Bhu-Aadhaar and digitisation of land records: With the proposal of land-related reforms in the Budget, a look at what’s ahead for the State governments

Comprehensive digitisation of land records for both rural and urban areas was announced in the Union Budget 2024. It is a welcome move but there are many challenges for its successful implementation all over India within the next three years as envisaged in the Budget.

Presently, land records are computerised in 24 out of 28 States in India. Only in the four northeastern States of Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya, Mizoram and Sikkim, land records are not fully computerised. The need of the hour therefore is a system of uniformity in land records maintenance across the States.

There are five States in India which have separate land records for city and rural properties: Maharashtra, Goa, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh. Most of the other States have only one land record.

The southern States of Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu computerised rural land records with their own resources during the period 2001-2007. Soon after, in 2008, an ambitious project known as Digital India Land Records Modernisation Programme was launched by the Government of India to provide an integrated land records management system.

Bhu-Aadhaar is generation of a Unique Land Parcel Identification Number (ULPIN) for each land across the State. Once the Unique Land Parcel Identification Number (ULPIN) or Bhu-Aadhaar is generated, it is stamped on the physical land record document held by the owner. The same ULPIN will be permanently attached to the plot of land. Even if the land is transferred, sub-divided, or undergoes any change, the ULPIN will remain the same for that geographic boundary. The main advantages of ULPIN is that it provides unique digital identity to every plot of land and ensures accurate land records through ground-level mapping and measurement and also removes ambiguity in plot identification, which often leads to land disputes.

Andhra Pradesh was the first State to complete 100% ULPIN coverage. In fact the State of Andhra Pradesh has the best practice of land records maintenance among all other States in India as Bhu-Aadhaar is also mapped with individual Aadhaar numbers of all land owners. The States of Karnataka, Odisha, Telangana, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh have achieved 60-90% ULPIN coverage. Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Assam are lagging behind in ULPIN implementation due to administrative and operational challenges. Lack of digitised cadastral maps, which provide meticulous information about land divisions and boundary sizes, has also hampered interlinking of records in some States.

The main challenge is the lack of synchronisation between the Department of Stamps and Registration records and Revenue Department records in many States in India. Property registration details of a land are not automatically transferred to the Revenue Department for online mutation in many States. It is done only in a few States presently. Digital mapping of land parcels has not been done in many States, predominantly for urban properties.