Punjab giving banks access to digital land record

LAHORE: The Punjab Land Record Authority (PLRA) is providing banking institutions with access to landownership documents, a move that will completely eliminate the roles of patwaris and tehsildars, who are notorious for their corrupt practices, The News has learnt.

The government of Punjab started computerisation/digitisation of land records with overall objectives to improve service delivery and to enhance the perceived level of tenure security. It also established the PLRA under the administrative control of the Board of Revenue (BoR) Punjab.

Zafar Iqbal, the managing director of the PLRA, recently took 15 leading banks of the country into confidence about this initiative, which was now possible as rural land record has been completely digitised and urban mostly.

“This initiative would facilitate the banks in the verification of land collateral offered by their prospective borrowers and eliminate the risk of fraud,” Iqbal said likening this access to the one provided by National Database and Registration Authority (NADRA) to the banks.

He said currently the PLRA was looking after land purchase and transfer services through its offices established in all districts of the province. “In the year 2016-17 the PLRA served 2.3 million customers,” Iqbal added.

Experts say this initiative would vastly increase the ease of doing business in Punjab and should be replicated all over Pakistan. Secure land rights were a major hindrance for prospective investors in Pakistan.

Punjab province’s entire land record has been placed on the website of the authority, though access to this information was subject to permission.

In times to come the PLRA is expected to allow online verification and after securing the software these permissions may be allowed within next two months. However, even after computerisation of land record, complaints have started pouring in about the inaccessibility of staff at the PLRA service centers. This happened because unanticipated burden on the service centers started causing delays, which defeated the purpose of digitisation of land record.

The higher objective of the project is to improve the land records service delivery in the province, contributing to long-lasting tenure security initiative Project Management Unit (PMU-BoR). The strategy was to make land rights secure reducing the potential for disputes and enabling an improved investment climate are urgent tasks for the BoR and have been prioritised at the highest levels.

Nevertheless, it was revealed that not all objectives of the initiative were fully achieved. Though land record has been fully digitised but only 40 percent is available with the authority. For the rest the authority has to wait for any transaction of transfer or sales of land, which could now be only through the PLRA. At that time the seller would be asked to furnish the computerised national identity card CNIC. Manipulation of land record however will not be possible now.

Patawris used to transfer lands illegally or increase the ownership at the expense of other. This will not be possible now. Now no two loans would be issued against one piece of land.

The PLRA staff does have access to the land record but the relevant staff is also required to verify identity through thumb impression. This eliminates tempering of record if someone hacks the password.

The PLRA hopes that with the computerisation of all the record, the collateral value of land will increase.

Punjab has 25,258 revenue states that are either urban or peri-urban. Until now the record of 23,216 urban revenue states has been computerized, while rural land record has been digitised entirely. Now no passbook is needed as the digital land record gives full picture of the status of the land of the farmers.