Attorney paper fraud in Ghaziabad: 5 sub-registrars appointed

GHAZIABAD: The UP government has appointed five new sub-registrars to take charge of tehsils in the city and replace four officials who were suspended on Thursday after an SIT probe found them guilty of executing power of attorney deeds without verifying addresses.
“The government announced the appointments on Friday. The posts were vacant after four sub-registrars were suspended in connection with a fraud involving power of attorney deeds,” said Vivek Srivastava, ADM (finance).
The five sub-registrars who were appointed are Ramesh Chandra, Kripa Shankar, Subodh Kumar Rai, Rajesh Kumar Saroj and Richa Pandey. They have been assigned the responsibility of tehsils from 1 to 5, respectively.
The four suspended sub-registrars came under the scanner when 25,000 attorney documents were executed in Ghaziabad between October and December last year. This was much more than those prepared in other districts.
Since the execution of power of attorney is not allowed in many states, people often approach middlemen in UP and get the papers readied after forging documents. Through the power of attorney, ownership rights of a property are transferred from the person whose name is on the registry document to the one nominated by the owner. This results in loss of revenue to the exchequer since the owner may be from another state.
“After 25,000 deeds were executed in just three months in Ghaziabad, the SIT was formed. It was found that middlemen hired by people from other states had submitted forged documents to get the attorney papers executed. Most of the addresses were of Khoda, Makanpur and other such congested areas that are difficult to verify,” a lawyer with knowledge of the case said.
According to the UP Registration Act of 1908, only a person who is a domicile of the state can get the power of attorney executed after producing an address proof. It was found that many people from Haryana, where power of attorneys are not allowed, had got them executed through forged documents in Ghaziabad.