BELAGAVI: The Karnataka government on Thursday tabled a bill in the Legislative Assembly to enhance the rate of stamp duty and to make provisions to levy stamp duty on bank guarantees, aimed at shoring up the revenue.
The bill titled The Karnataka Stamp (Amendment) Bill, 2023 was tabled in the Assembly by Rural Development Minister Priyank Kharge on behalf of Revenue Minister Krishna Byre Gowda.
The bill in its statement of objects and reasons notes that — the bill amends the Karnataka Stamp Act, 1957, to enhance the rate of stamp duty in certain cases and to make a separate provision regarding levy of stamp duty on bank guarantee.
There is no extra expenditure involved in the proposed legislature measure, which seeks to hike stamp duty on legal documents such as: deeds, affidavits, mortgage deeds, powers of attorney, limited liability partnerships, and other agreements or extracts or certified copies of documents.
It proposes to double the duty levied, and the hike is upto five-fold for some instruments.
While the stamp duty on adoption deeds will go up from Rs 500 to Rs 1,000, affidavits with a stamp duty levy of Rs 20 will be up to Rs 100.
Stamp duty on powers of attorney will be hiked from Rs 100 to Rs 500, and when more than five but not more than 10 persons act jointly, the stamp duty will go up from Rs 200 to Rs 1,000.
Stamp duty is proposed to go up from Rs 1,000 per share to Rs 5,000. For partition deeds of properties located in urban areas, it will be Rs 3,000 per share instead of the current Rs 500 for properties located outside urban limits.
As per the bill the stamp duty on divorce papers, will be up from Rs 100 to Rs 500, while for Agricultural properties’ partitioning, it will have a stamp duty of Rs 1,000 per share, up from Rs 250.
