Agra | More than 20,000 property registries, each valued at over ₹10 lakh, have come under the scanner of the Income Tax Department in Agra after officials detected widespread non-reporting and omission of Permanent Account Numbers (PAN) in registration records.
According to officials familiar with the investigation, property registrations executed over the past five financial yearsacross multiple Sub-Registrar Offices (SROs) were either not reported to the Income Tax system or were reported without mandatory PAN details. The department has now initiated a comprehensive scrutiny to determine whether these lapses were procedural failures or part of deliberate tax-evasion practices.
Gaps in Reporting Trigger Investigation
The issue surfaced during recent Income Tax surveys conducted at the Kiraoli and Sadar tehsil sub-registrar offices. Investigators found that since FY 2019–20, the Sadar SRO had not submitted a single report of a property transaction exceeding ₹10 lakh where PAN details were missing.
This anomaly became particularly striking in light of the real-estate expansion in Agra’s peripheral areas, where plotted developments, residential colonies and township projects have multiplied rapidly. Officials said that such growth should normally result in regular high-value transaction reporting, making the absence of data highly suspicious.
Preliminary checks suggest that several transactions were intentionally completed without quoting PAN, potentially allowing buyers, sellers and developers to keep these deals outside the formal tax surveillance network.
Builders, Buyers and Intermediaries Under Lens
With missing records now being uploaded and reconciled, the Income Tax Department expects scrutiny to extend to multiple stakeholders involved in these transactions. Officials indicated that the investigation could cover:
- Builders and colonisers involved in bulk land sales
- High-value property purchasers whose income profiles do not match transaction values
- Intermediaries and facilitators who assisted in registrations without compliance
In several cases, officials have already managed to trace PAN details retrospectively and have begun back-tracking financial trails, including banking records and linked transactions.
What the Law Mandates
Under existing regulations governing property transactions:
- Quoting PAN is mandatory at the time of property registration
- In the absence of PAN, Form 60 must be submitted
- If income is claimed solely from agriculture, Form 61 is required
- Sub-Registrar Offices must report all high-value transactions (₹10 lakh and above without PAN) to the Income Tax Department through Form 61A
These mechanisms are designed to automatically flag suspicious transactions and integrate real-estate data into the tax intelligence system. Officials said that in Agra’s case, such reporting appears to have been negligible or absent for years.
Sub-Registrar Offices Also Under Scrutiny
The probe has widened to examine the institutional role of SROs, focusing on whether the failure to report was due to:
- Inadequate training or oversight
- Weak digital integration with central tax systems
- Deliberate suppression of information to benefit influential parties
If responsibility is fixed, officials said disciplinary action against erring personnel could follow, along with audits of suspect registries and recovery proceedings where tax evasion is established.
What Comes Next
Income Tax officials are currently analysing the entire five-year dataset, matching registry values with buyer-seller credentials, bank transaction trails and income disclosures. Authorities believe the exercise may lead to significant revelations of undeclared income linked to real-estate transactions.
The findings are also expected to strengthen calls for tighter digital reporting, automated audits and deeper integration between state registration systems and central tax databases — particularly in the real-estate sector, which has long been viewed as vulnerable to under-reporting.
For now, officials say the scrutiny will continue, with notices, reassessments and recovery proceedings likely once discrepancies are conclusively established.
