The Visakhapatnam land registration department is likely to miss the revenue target by over 25 per cent this fiscal.
For current financial year, the government had fixed a revenue target of Rs 304 crore for the department from the urban region, which has 8 sub-registrar offices. However, up to February it could earn only Rs 186 crore as against Rs 200 crore during the corresponding period last fiscal.
“Due to the recession land transactions have reduced significantly in this region and this reflected in our revenues too,” P Venkateswara Rao, district registrar, told Business Standard. Last fiscal about 50,000 land transactions took place in this region, but this year, this declined 45-50 per cent.
The department expects another Rs 25-30 crore in March to close the fiscal with revenues of around Rs 216 crore. “The real estate boom has gone bust. We are now not bothered about targets. We are just struggling to achieve at least last year’s revenue figures of Rs 224 crore,” he added
In 2007-08, the Visakhapatnam Urban Development Authority (Vuda) auctioned land at higher prices, which helped the department earn over Rs 90 crore. This year too, though Vuda proposed to sell several lands, the response from public and the real estate companies was not very encouraging. Hence, the department earned only Rs 8-10 crore from land auction deals.
Till last fiscal, Madhurawada sub-registrar office was the main source of revenue for the department in this region and generated about Rs 90 crore revenues. This is unlikely to cross Rs 30 crore this year, he said. In Bhimunipatnam, registrations declined 40 per cent this year, as compared with last year.