There is a strong feeling that over the past few decades, unfortunately, India has become a hub of corruption, frauds, black money and scams. Property disputes are on the rise too. Invariably, people come to us seeking legal advice from our expert litigation lawyers. To curb these, the government is doing everything possible from implementing demonetization to seizing benami properties.
Creating a transparent environment for all the citizens has become a major focus for the present government. In order to achieve this, the Indian government is introducing new rules and exercising new limits related to investments, finance, and property. This step directly or indirectly affects not only the permanent citizens but also the NRIs.
Even with the government trying its best to eradicate corruption, human nature still remains a huge barrier. Due to various reasons, the NRIs tend to depend on their friends and relatives for the management of their properties. Despite strong laws, this dependency often leads to problems such as unauthorized occupancy and even loss of ownership entirely.
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Living away from roots is always challenging, and on top of that when NRIs are faced with false allegations in the country to which once they belonged, it becomes tough for them to manage things.
Though most of the time these accusations are either baseless or non-existent altogether, it becomes dreadful for the NRIs to visit India and maintain their properties here. Often these false litigations are initiated by the friends, relatives or others. These invalid implications are made to prevent them from coming to India and seizing their property or maintaining its illegal occupancy.
Certain precautionary steps can be taken to avoid all the property issues that NRIs face without any intentional fault such as Updated documents and issue of Specialised Power of Attorney (POA).
Often knowing all the details about the property is not enough. Maintaining proper and appropriate documents required to claim the ownership is necessary. It is imperative for an NRI to possess validated title deed, current updated documents with ground reality of the property to protect themselves from any fraud such as illegal possession or selling off their land or false criminal litigation or transfer of assets.
Maintaining updated property documents can help NRIs prove their innocence and claim their property at any point in time.
The necessary documents include:
- Clear document stating the description of the property
- Explicit mention of the area and size
- Explicit mention of the name
- Details of the property after the proper evaluation the same
Translation of the documents in the language understood by the NRIs is necessarily required.
These documents should clearly state information about what the NRIs own and possess in India.
For an NRI, it is tough to travel to India from time to time to manage their property and protect themselves from any fraud. Thus, they need a viable solution which is available as Power of Attorney (POA). The POA document is a crucial document which may even be used against us if not made properly or if handed over to the wrong person.
The POA is a legal document which authorizes some other person to act on behalf of the owner (the NRI). There are two types of POA – General POA and Special POA.
- The General POA gives the authority to act on the NRI’s behalf in all general matters, which also means that the POA holder may even take advantage of the received power.
- The Special POA is a legal document that authorizes the other person to act on certain matters on the NRI’s behalf. It is a restricted document that limits the action of the POA holder.
Thus, it is beneficial, in fact, essential that NRIs give special POA instead of the general POA.
The issuance and hence usage of POAs is a very sensitive matter which should be handled carefully by all NRIs to avoid troubles and confusions later on. Along with it, it is must keep all the property-related documents up-to-date.