Unlike a few other states in India, there is no restriction on buying Agricultural land in Telangana. Initially we thought of buying agriculture land in our home town.

But after visiting a few fields and their (lofty) prices, we finally settled on buying the land closer to our current residence in Hyderabad. We began our search from Sangareddy district, and on the way we found a few land brokers.

Now… Agriculture lands are like hot cakes! We were barely getting enough time to perform the background check. If we liked a piece of land, and sought land documents from broker – on the very next day brokers would say that the land was sold. This happened twice with us. So, I & my brother decided to complete the background check as quickly as possible hereon.

So, we happened to come across a land in Hatnoora mandal and decided to go for it – in spite of the land is being oddly shaped and rocky. Right after we decided to buy the land, we sought the land pattadar passbook and Title Deed’s xerox copies. Fortunately for us, this time we got the document quickly.

We cross checked the ownership and survey number from online portal http://mabhoomi.telangana.gov.in and verified the list of prohibited properties from Prohibited Properties listings, to make sure that there are no pending cases or litigation on the given survey number. We also verified the Village map to understand the land boundaries and to ensure that there is no road through the agriculture land. Additionally we obtained the Encumbrance certificate to understand the land history and cross checked the link documents. Whilst doing all these verifications we visited the land about 2 to 3 times, and enquired the adjacent land owners too.

Finally we decided to meet the land owner and enter into Sale Agreement after negotiating the price. One fine day we visited the land owner’s place and after a long discussion the price was finalised. We also managed to convince the land owner to excavate the rocks from the land. We then proceeded to a nearby document writer and drafted the Sale Agreement, outlining the advance being paid (in the form of Cheque) and agreed to complete the registration within 45 days by paying full amount. We made sure to include the stone excavation part in the sale agreement to ensure that the Vendor should not deny later.

Tips on Sale Agreement:

1. Always pay the advance amount in the form of cheque and mention the cheque number in Sale Agreement. Never pay advance amount in cash.
2. Always mention higher duration like 3 months or 6 months to complete the transaction i.e. registration process. In our case though we decided to complete the transaction within 15 days we kept 45 days in the agreement. It is advisable to complete the transaction as quickly as possible, even if you mention a higher duration.
3. Don’t forget to mention one important point – if the Vendor changes his mind and wants to cancel the Sale Agreement, he has to pay 2 times or 3 times of token amount that you have paid along with interest amount.

I will write separately on Agriculture land sale agreement and include a sample sale agreement document later.

After completion of sale agreement, on the very next day we visited the land. To our surprise part of the land was ploughed and when we enquire, one of the previous owner of the land did this by claiming that he has more land than what he sold and hence, he would get some of it if the land is surveyed. So we decided to get the land surveyed to understand the exact boundaries and to resolve conflicts with neighbours.

Initially we were considering a Government land survey, but we got to know that it would be time consuming and could take months to complete the survey. So we have decided to get a private survey done first, while also applying for a Government survey. I applied for Government survey through mee seva and paid Rs. 360 towards survey fee.

I will write separately on Agriculture land survey later.

At the same time, vendor began the rock excavation and gave the work to a contractor. Contractor tried to complete the work for only name sake. He did not remove all the rocks. During our land price negotiations, we had raised the point of rocks and tried to negotiate on price as the rock excavation would be costly and would never really know the amount of rock buried under the land. Vendor assured that he will excavate the rocks up to the depth of 4 feet and deliver us the rock free land for cultivation. But this proved to be bad decision on our part as the contractor would never listen to us and he only tried to remove a few rocks and covered rest with soil.

Always reduce the price that you are paying to land owner and get the rock excavation work done by yourself, so that you can complete it as per your satisfaction.

After conducting private survey we came to know that there is indeed some excess land, but we weren’t sure about the survey number where this excess land was falling in. Also, we our neighbouring land was belongs to the government, so we weren’t sure about the boundaries of government land either. This meant that we had to get the government survey done before going for registration.

Meanwhile our Vendor has got better offer from some brokers and he started asking to cancel the sale agreement as the government survey was taking time. Somehow we managed to get the government survey done quickly, caught hold of him and made him wait until fulfilment of conditions mentioned in sale agreement.

As said earlier it is a time consuming; we need to personally talk to them and make sure to get them to visit the land. Somehow my brother managed to get the survey done quickly and came to know the land boundaries to apart the government land.

Now we got lot of clarity, since we knew the exact boundaries of the land marked by deputy mandal surveyor. By doing all these, we literally just met our sale agreement dead line (which was 45 days) to complete the registration. We were in a hurry to complete the registration before completion of the time lines mentioned in the sale agreement. This was the reason why I was suggesting to put longer duration to complete the registration as we never know what will happen on field.

Finally on an auspicious day we planned to get the land registered and were able to successfully complete the process within the stipulated period as per the sale agreement. We got our registered document after 3 working day of registration date. Once we received the documents, first thing we did was to get the encumbrance certificate which should show our names and record the recent transaction. We have applied for e-passbook and mutation. Hope this helps to my fellow budding farmers.

Happy Farming..!