Govt aims to distribute 2.2 crore Svamitva property cards by March 2026, says Panchayati Raj secretary

New Delhi: The government aims to distribute 21.9 million Svamitva property cards by March 2026 to validate properties in rural India and help villagers use their property as collateral against credit, said Vivek Bharadwaj, union secretary of Panchayati Raj ministry, on Wednesday.

This includes 5.8 million cards which will be distributed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi to 50,000 villages across 12 states and UTs on 27 December. The government has so far provided 13.7 million Svamitva property cards under the Svamitva scheme.

Purpose of the scheme

The Svamitva scheme, launched by Modi in April 2020, is aimed at creating records of rights (RoR) in revenue documents for inhabited areas (as opposed to agricultural land) in villages.

“Land ownership is not clear in developing countries. If the property ownership right is not clear, no financial institute is ready to lend someone money. If they are unable to borrow from financial institutes, they cannot do any economic activity. There are no credit linkages because asset ownership is not clearly defined,” Bharadwaj said. 

“If your property ownership rights are not clear and you need to borrow, you don’t have any assets or property which you can use as collateral to get credit. Hence, we tried to cover Abadi (inhabited) land in rural India under the Svamitva scheme.”

The scheme also aims to demarcate inhabited land in rural areas through the latest surveying drone and GIS technology. About 344,868 villages are targeted to be covered under the scheme, of which 92% (317,000) have already surveyed through drones.

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The parliamentary standing committee on rural development and panchayati raj departments recently raised concerns over the implementation of drone-based mapping of land parcels in rural areas.

The scheme covers aspects like facilitating monetization of properties and enabling bank loans, reducing property-related disputes, and comprehensive village-level planning, which will be the stepping-stone towards making rural India self-reliant.

Bharadwaj saidall 344,868 villages will be covered by March 2026, one year later than scheduled as several states are in the process of issuing property cards.

Under the Svamitva scheme, Survey of India—the central institution for mapping and surveying—is preparing maps using drones and information provided by state governments about property owners after field verification.

Of 662,000 villages in 30 states and Union territories (UTs), the scheme is being implemented in 344,868 notified villages. West Bengal, Bihar, Telangana, Meghalaya and Nagaland did not participate in the scheme, and Tamil Nadu only conducted a pilot project under the scheme.

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