The Dharwad Bench of the Karnataka High Court has held that the State cannot render a legally recognised and transferable leasehold interest incapable of being conveyed due to a technical deficiency/defect in their software.

The observation was made in a plea seeking a direction to the state government to accept and register sale deeds executed by the petitioner and to provide an alternative mode of registration until technical glitches in the Kaveri 2.0 portal are rectified.

The petitioner— a builder who had acquired a land under Nirantara Patta (permanent lease) and constructed a residential building consisting of 34 flats— submitted that after the Kaveri 2.0 portal was introduced, the sale deeds of 13 flats were not processed because his name appeared as “Holder/Tax Payer” instead of “Owner”.

The petitioner contended that the issue lay in the manner in which the municipal/e-property data was mapped and transmitted to the Kaveri-2.0 software. The underlying title documents, according to the petitioner, disclose a permanent and transferable leasehold interest. Communication between government authorities also recognised that the API mapping defect was affecting several perpetual lease arrangements in Belagavi city.

Justice Sachin Shankar Magadum in his order said:

“A State instrumentality cannot say that because its computer system is not configured to recognise a particular lawful interest, the citizen's right to deal with that interest must remain suspended indefinitely. Technology is intended to facilitate the exercise of rights and the discharge of statutory functions. It cannot become an impediment to the exercise of substantive rights...

The respondents cannot, by reason of a technical deficiency in the software or the existing data-mapping mechanism, render a legally recognised and transferable leasehold interest incapable of being conveyed. A software system is a means for implementation of the law, it cannot become a source for extinguishing or restricting substantive rights which otherwise flow from law and the title documents"

The court said that the State authorities had themselves recognised the difficulty relating to registration of properties held under Nirantara Patta/Perpetual Lease and the need to suitably modify the existing API/mapping mechanism so that the name of the leaseholder, with appropriate classification of his interest, is transmitted to the Kaveri-2.0 system.

It added, “The State is undoubtedly entitled to undertake statutory scrutiny of every document presented for registration, including scrutiny of the title, transferability of the interest, compliance with the terms of the lease, payment of stamp duty and registration fee and compliance with all other statutory requirements. However, such statutory scrutiny cannot be substituted by or reduced to an automated rejection generated merely because the software does not recognise the leaseholder's name.”

The Court further noted that the petitioner's permanent leasehold interest in the land was heritable and transferable, thus forming a legally recognisable title to the leasehold estate capable of being conveyed, subject to the terms of the grant and applicable law.

Accordingly, the Court quashed the communication rejecting the petitioner's sale deeds solely on the ground that he was reflected as a perpetual lessee/leaseholder and not as the absolute owner in the municipal/e-property records or that his name was not fetched by Kaveri 2.0 portal.

The Court further directed the government's Municipal Administration director, Urban Development department principal secretary and other authorities to amend API mapping mechanism between municipal e-property records and Kaveri 2.0 portal for proper classification of the petitioner's name, within two months. The Court further said that if the authorities fail to amend the software within the two months, the jurisdictional Sub-Registrar must process and register the sale deeds manually.

Case: Gopalrao vs State of Karnataka & others

WRIT PETITION NO. 103223 OF 2026 (GM-RES)

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