Check 1: the Record of Rights, and the name on it
The Record of Rights (RoR, the khatiyan) is the Government's record of who holds each plot. Open it on Bhulekh by district, tahasil and village, then by khatiyan number, plot number or the recorded tenant's name. It names each recorded tenant with the father's name, caste and residence, and lists each plot with its kisam (the land's class), its boundaries and its area.
Match it line by line to the deed you are about to sign: the seller's name, the khata and plot numbers, the area and the kisam. A finally published RoR "shall be presumed to be correct until it is proved by evidence to be incorrect" (Section 13(3), Orissa Survey and Settlement Act, 1958). And in Odisha the Sub-Registrar "shall not register any document presented to him for registration unless the transferor produce the record of rights" (Section 22-A(2), Registration (Odisha Amendment) Act, 2013). Check the record before you pay an advance, not at the registration office.
Check 2: the encumbrance certificate
The registration books are public: Books 1 and 2 and the indexes to Book 1 "shall be at all times open to inspection by any person" (Section 57(1), Registration Act, 1908). The encumbrance certificate (EC) is the Sub-Registrar's search of them for one piece of land: apply online at IGR Odisha with the land's village, khata and plot and the years to search. The public-service limit to issue it is 7 days (ORTPS services).
The certificate lists the registered documents affecting the land in the years searched, and nothing else: "A certificate of encumbrance shall contain a complete list of all acts and encumbrances affecting the property in question" (Rule 123(2), Orissa Registration Rules, 1988). Form No. 25 says the search found nothing; Form No. 26 lists what it found. How to apply and how to read one: the encumbrance certificate in Odisha.
Check 3: the seller's deed and the chain behind it
A sale of land worth Rs 100 or more "can be made only by a registered instrument" (Section 54, Transfer of Property Act, 1882), and the Registration Act makes registration of such a transfer compulsory (Section 17(1)(b), Registration Act, 1908). Every transfer in the chain should therefore be a registered deed: an unregistered agreement or a notarised paper does not pass the land. Certified copies of earlier registered deeds come from the Sub-Registrar's office, within 7 days by the public-service limit (ORTPS services).
Some land the Sub-Registrar must refuse to register unless the competent authority's sanction is produced: land of the State Government or a local authority, land of a religious institution under the Odisha Hindu Religious Endowments Act, 1951, land recorded in the name of Lord Jagannath, Puri, Bhoodan land vested in the Odisha Bhoodan Yagna Samiti, and Wakf land. The same section bars any transfer that a State or Central Act prohibits (Section 22-A(1), Registration (Odisha Amendment) Act, 2013).
Check 4: the mutation, and what it does not prove
After a sale is registered, the Tahasildar corrects the RoR in a mutation case, opened "on receipt of a notice from the Registrar or Sub-Registrar" or on an application (Rule 34, Orissa Survey and Settlement Rules, 1962); an uncontested case has a 7-day limit (ORTPS services). If the seller bought the land and the RoR still shows the previous owner, the seller's own mutation is pending or was refused: ask for the case number and check it on the Tahasil portal.
A mutation does not settle ownership either way. The Supreme Court: "Mutation of a property in the revenue record does not create or extinguish title nor has it any presumptive value on title" (Smt. Sawarni v. Smt. Inder Kaur, 1996). The process, the fees and the appeal: land mutation in Odisha.
Check 5: court cases on the names
Court cases are a separate search from the land records. District court cases can be searched by party name on the eCourts services portal, and the Orissa High Court keeps its own case records. Search every name in the land's chain, not only the seller's.
Check 6: land the seller cannot sell to you
Scheduled Tribe land outside a Scheduled Area. "Any transfer of a holding or part thereof by a raiyat, belonging to a Scheduled Tribe shall be void" unless it is in favour of a member of a Scheduled Tribe, or of anyone else "with the previous permission in writing of the Revenue Officer" (Section 22(1), Orissa Land Reforms Act, 1960). For a sale, the Revenue Officer may not give that permission "unless he is satisfied that a purchaser belonging to a Scheduled Tribe willing to pay the market price for the land is not available", and no registering officer may register the deed without it (Section 22(4)). The same rules apply to a raiyat belonging to a Scheduled Caste (Section 22(5)).
Scheduled Tribe land inside a Scheduled Area. Section 22 does not apply there (Section 22(6)(b)); the Orissa Scheduled Areas Transfer of Immovable Property (by Scheduled Tribes) Regulation, 1956 does. A transfer of immovable property by a member of a Scheduled Tribe "shall be absolutely null and void and of no force or effect whatsoever, unless such transfer is made in favour of another member of a Scheduled Tribe", apart from a mortgage to a public financial institution for an agricultural loan; and a transfer to a member of a Scheduled Tribe paid for by someone who is not one counts as a transfer to a non-tribal (Section 3(1) and its Explanation I, Regulation 2 of 1956). Section 3(1) has no permission for a transfer to a non-tribal.
The RoR records each tenant's caste (Check 1): read it before anything else.
Check 7: agricultural land and its conversion (Section 8-A)
Section 8-A is how agricultural land is converted to another use: on the raiyat's application the authorised officer may allow it if it does not violate a master plan or development plan, the raiyat pays the conversion fee, "and the kissam of the land so converted shall be corrected accordingly" (Section 8-A(1), Orissa Land Reforms Act, 1960). The fee since 2023: "one per centum of the market value shall be payable per acre" (Odisha Land Reforms (Amendment) Act, 2023). The application is made online on the Revenue Department's portal, and the public-service limit for the case is 60 days (ORTPS services).
If you mean to build on the plot, check that the kisam in the RoR is already the converted one, or that the conversion order exists.
Check 8: a plot in a layout, and the development authority
Dividing land into plots for sale is a "real estate project" (Section 2(zn), Real Estate (Regulation and Development) Act, 2016), and no promoter may advertise or sell a plot in one, in a planning area, without registering it with the Real Estate Regulatory Authority (Section 3(1)). The exception is land that "does not exceed five hundred square meters or the number of apartments proposed to be developed does not exceed eight inclusive of all phases" (Section 3(2)(a)). Search the project on ORERA before you pay a promoter, as for any new layout in the growing areas around Bhubaneswar.
In a development authority's area, the authority gives land use information for a plot within 3 days and a certified copy of an approved building plan within 7 days, by the public-service limits (ORTPS services).
Check 9: stamp duty, the registration fee and TDS
A sale deed pays stamp duty of 5% (the Act's 8%, reduced from 5 August 2008) on "the amount or value of the consideration for such conveyance as set-forth therein or the market value of the property whichever is higher" (Revenue Department order, 2008); a sale or gift deed to a woman "shall be charged @ 4% instead of 5%" (S.R.O. 592/2016). The registration fee is 2% (Table of Fees, S.R.O. 51/2001), and IGR Odisha's fee table lists the same rates. Every deed's rate, the benchmark value and the slot booking: stamp duty and registration fees in Odisha. The public-service limit to register a document is 3 days (ORTPS services).
A buyer paying a resident seller for land worth Rs 50 lakh or more, by the price or the stamp duty value, whichever is higher, deducts 1% as TDS; rural agricultural land is outside the rule, and the buyer may use a PAN in place of a TAN (Section 194-IA). For a payment from 1 April 2026 the rule is in Section 393(1) of the Income-tax Act, 2025, at the same 1% and a threshold of "Fifty lakh rupees" (Section 393). If the seller is a non-resident, the deduction is made under Section 195 instead, at the rates in force for the seller's gain (a non-resident seller).
Buying from abroad: NRI and OCI buyers
A non-resident Indian (NRI) or an Overseas Citizen of India (OCI) may "acquire immovable property in India other than an agricultural land or farm house or plantation property" (Rule 24, Foreign Exchange Management (Non-debt Instruments) Rules, 2019); the Home Ministry's notification gives an OCI the same position as an NRI for this (Ministry of Home Affairs, 2021). The price must come from abroad through banking channels or from a non-resident account (NRE, FCNR(B) or NRO), and "Payments should not be made through travellers' cheque and foreign currency notes" (RBI; Master Direction). In Odisha, read the kisam in the RoR first: agricultural land is outside what an NRI or OCI may buy.
A buyer who cannot be here signs a power of attorney. For the attorney to present the deed for registration, the power of attorney of a principal who "does not reside in India" must be "executed before and authenticated by a Notary Public, or any Court, Judge, Magistrate, Indian Consul or Vice-Consul, or representative of the Central Government" (Section 33(1)(c), Registration Act, 1908). An instrument executed only outside India "may be stamped within three months after it has been first received in India" (Section 18(1), Indian Stamp Act, 1899).
Before you pay
The record, the registers and the courts are three separate searches, and each can hold what the others do not. Open the Record of Rights by plot (the lookup in Check 1), or find every parcel recorded under a name. Search one name across the courts, or run the Land Litigation Check on the names in the land's chain: 499 credits for up to 30 names, in the Orissa High Court and the district court where the land lies.
No EC yet: we fetch it from IGR Odisha. The AI title report reads the EC, the Record of Rights and the deeds together, every finding cited to its page; our empanelled advocates give a written, signed opinion; and for a home loan, the bank's panel advocate prepares a title search report (what it covers).