Dealing with land in Tamil nadu

  • When dealing with land for buying / selling in Tamil nadu,India , we get to hear a lot of terms like vilanga saanru ( Encumbrance certificate), pathram (registration document), patta, survey number, FMB sketch etc. Just thought would document some things i learned in the process.

  • Every land will have a Survey number and a sub division number, that will help us to locate the land (atleast approximately) within the district, taluk and village. Nowadays every site/plot gets its own sub division number,but not in case of older lands.

  • Say we decide to buy a land, usually people check for the history of transactions done for that land through vilanga saanru ( Encumbrance certificate). It is nothing but a record of registration transactions for that land recorded in the government systems. One can easily view the EC / Encumbrance certificate for the land from https://tnreginet.gov.in/portal/ by navigating to E-Services -> Encumbrance certificate and inputting the District, Taluk, Village, Survey Number, sub division number and also the start date and end date within which to fetch the registration transactions details.

  • Usually when registering a land ie. buying a land from someone, there is a registration document in which both the seller and buyer signs in the registration office, where this transaction is registered. The registration document or pathram is returned on the same day or within a week to the buyer, which is the main document that shows the ownership of the land.

  • There is also something called patta, that shows list of all owners for the specific survey number, sub division number combo. Once the document registration is complete, usually we will have to place a request to get our names added to the patta too. But i also heard it is automatic now, ie once the registration is successful an automatic request to get the names updated in patta is raised by the registration department automatically. Also every patta will also have a patta number.

  • There will be a table in patta document that gives the exact land measurements. Usually it is given in hectares and ares and we will need to convert that to cents. 1 are = 2.47 cent.

  • There is also something called an FMB sketch which is maintained by the Survey and Settlement Department. FMB sketch for a specific survey number, sub division number combo can be retrieved by navigating to FMB sketch link in https://eservices.tn.gov.in/eservicesnew/index.html . Land measurements in the FMB sketch will be usually in meters.