Tamil Nadu’s revenue from stamp duty and registration fee remains robust in 2021-22 and is back to pre-COVID-19 levels, according to data from the State’s Registration Department.
Stamp duty and registration fee, one of the key components of the State’s own tax revenue, stood at ₹8,448.42 crore in April-November 2021, when compared to ₹5,687.64 crore in the comparable period last year. A senior State Government official said the robust revenue collections were driven by property registration, and in a few days time, the collections will touch ₹10,000 crore for this fiscal year. The revised Budget presented by the DMK government after coming to power has estimated revenue from stamp duty and registration charges at ₹13,252.67 crore in 2021-22, as against ₹14,879.37 crore projected in the Interim Budget for 2021-22.
Across States, revenue from stamp duties more than doubled in first quarter of 2021-22 and recorded a growth of 53.4% in the second quarter of 2021-22 when compared to previous years, a half-yearly review of government finances by the Department of Economic and Policy Research, Reserve Bank of India, said.
Suresh Krishn, president, Confederation of Real Estate Developers Association of India (Credai), Tamil Nadu, said the revenue collection pointed to healthy signs of recovery in the real estate sector. However, he pointed out that Tamil Nadu had one of the highest rates of stamp duty and registration fees (7% plus 4%) across States.
Noting that reduction in stamp duty rates by States like Maharashtra and Karnataka had yielded good results, Mr. Krishn said a similar move in the State, even for a smaller window of one year, could boost the revenue further.
“People had cut discretionary spending during the pandemic due to fear of job loss. However, things have recovered, enabling people to use their savings to buy homes,” Mr. Krishn said.
Munuswamy Anandan, chairman and managing director, Aptus Value Housing Finance India, said at least the reduction should be considered for affordable housing, where the demand is higher, and it would boost construction in smaller cities. He said the property demand was also driven by lower interest rates so far, but there were indications of that it might move higher in coming months amid inflationary pressures.
Mr. Anandan said a faster move towards digitisation of land records would help in improving efficiency of the property buying and registration process.