PUNE: Tenants registering their leave and licence agreements will soon be exempt from visiting police stations for verification as the state registration department plans to integrate data from all the 1,130 police stations across Maharashtra by February-end, registration department officials told TOI on Friday.
The rollout, initially delayed due to software updates, will connect the registration department’s database with police stations across 44,000 villages. “Technical glitches and software updates were the key issues, but the new e-registration system for tenants along with online verification will be implemented across Maharashtra,” a senior registration department official said.
Recently, Pune resident deputy collector Jyoti Kadam issued an order mandating property owners in rural areas to submit tenant details to local police stations. The current directive requires owners to provide names, addresses, photographs, and two references for each tenant along with the e-registered documents. This order was meant to keep a check on tenants, especially because industrial areas have a lot of floating population. As a precautionary measure, it has been reiterated that it should be carried out in rural areas.
While Pune district earlier had the online tenant verification system operational for the city areas, it was defunct for quite some time due to software glitches. “Even as the system is not currently operational online, we can provide the excel sheet of the tenant registrations across the state to the police department,” officials said, noting that 85,000-90,000 leave and licence documents are e-registered monthly.
State registration department officials confirmed that mapping of police stations with the village-level data is underway. The upgraded system, replacing the 2019 version, will now require additional information including tenants’ five-year residential history and permanent address.
“The new system ensures citizens won’t have to physically visit police stations for verification. Police stations will have access to e-registration data from across the state,” a police officer said.
Sachin Shinghavi, Pune President of the Association of Real Estate Agents, welcomed the move. “We have been demanding such online verification for quite some time. The process encourages property owners to register their documents rather than just make agreements on affidavits,” he said.
Riza C, who has recently leased out her apartment in Pune city, said online verification will save trouble for citizens who have to visit police stations and check for their availability. “Once the registered document is submitted with all the data, police can easily verify it if the departmental data is integrated,”she said.
