MUMBAI:
Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched a property-card scheme on Sunday that he vowed would provide clarity of property rights in villages and enable farmers to use their property as collateral for loans from financial institutions.
Two-thirds of India’s population lives in rural areas, where few possess proper land records and property disputes are common.
“This is a historic effort towards rural transformation,” Modi said in a webcast speech while launching the programme.
The government plans to use drone technology to map land parcels in rural areas and cover some 620,000 villages over the next four years, Modi said.
“Despite owning houses, people were facing multiple problems while borrowing from banks. These people can now borrow very easily from banks after showing property cards issued under ownership scheme,” Modi said.The youth living in villages now can avail of bank loans against their properties to start out on their own, he said, asserting it is necessary for a developing country like India to have clear land ownership rights.
Property rights will give the youth self-confidence that can lead to their self-reliance, he said.
The beneficiaries are from 763 villages across six states, including 346 from Uttar Pradesh, 221 from Haryana, 100 from Maharashtra, 44 from Madhya Pradesh, 50 from Uttarakhand and two from Karnataka.
Modi said his government will try to give every household similar property cards over the next three-four years.
Modi said his government will try to give every household similar property cards over the next three-four years.
An initial batch of 100,000 people from over 750 villages across six states will begin to receive the digitised property cards this month.
Each card will have a unique identity number similar to the Aadhaar card – the world’s biggest biometric identity project, covering more than a billion people in India.
On the occasion, Modi also interacted with several beneficiaries of the Survey of Villages and Mapping with Improvised Technology in Village Areas (SVAMITVA) scheme and said it is big step for the country towards becoming 'aatmanirbhar' (self-reliant)
The Prime Minister's Office (PMO) has said the launch will enable around one lakh property holders to download their property cards through an SMS link sent on their mobile phones, and this would be followed by the physical distribution of property cards by respective state governments.