Chandigarh, September 28

In a major relief for thousands of people living in over 10,000 flats of group housing societies in the city, Punjab Governor and UT Administrator VP Singh Badnore has approved the new policy for transfer of flats.

The new policy will allow residents to become owners by getting the conveyance deed executed, which was stopped after the Administration started the process of framing the new policy. The Administration had started the process to review the policy for the transfer of flats six months ago.

The last transfer policy was announced in 2016. Under the current procedure, the sale/purchase was allowed on the basis of a conveyance deed, which had to be executed on the payment of stamp duty at the prevailing collector rates and after getting a no-objection certificate from the society concerned.

Sources said the Governor had given relief to residents by giving a one-time relaxation in the proposed unearned profit charges and the subsequent stamp duty. The sources said the Administration would not impose unearned profit charges on those who applied under the scheme in the next one year.

The Administration is likely to make public the details of the relaxations and other conditions soon. The residents got worried after the unearned profit charges clause was included in the policy.

The proposal for imposing unearned profit charges was included in the draft policy for transfer of flats. Unearned profit is the difference between the price paid by the original allottee and the market value of the site/building at the time of permission for the transfer. The Administration has proposed to charge 1/3rd of the unearned profit.