February 11, 2026: No stamp duty and registration fee should be charged on affordable housing projects under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana 2.0 (PMAY 2.0), a recent report by NITI Aayog has recommended.
In its report titled ‘A Comprehensive Framework to Promote Affordable Housing’, the government’s planning body noted that these additional charges make homes less affordable for low-income beneficiaries.
By exempting affordable homes from stamp duty and registration fees, the government can “meaningfully reduce the price at the lowest end of affordable housing and make ‘affordable housing’ more accessible to buyers and attractive to builders,” says the government’s policy think tank.
For context, land is a state subject in India. States depend heavily on land and property transactions for revenue. A major part of this revenue comes from stamp duty and registration fees on property transactions. Stamp duty varies from state to state and can fall in the range of 5 to 7% of the property value. Most states charge a flat 1% of the transaction value as the registration fee, while others have a fixed-fee structure.
Adding to the burden, banks do not include these duties while calculating the property value for loans. As a result, the buyer is forced to arrange this amount from their own pocket. In many states, borrowers are also required to pay a separate stamp duty on home loans sanctioned by banks.
“Several states, including Gujarat, Maharashtra, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Telangana, etc., have also eased the financial burden on beneficiaries by reducing stamp duty and registration charges for EWS (economically weaker sections) housing under PMAY-U, often charging only a token amount between INR 1 and INR 1,000 for houses up to 60 sq.m,” said the report. It added that this approach should be adopted more widely across the country.
The report highlights that bridging India’s housing affordability gap requires moving beyond subsidies and focusing on structural reforms. Unlocking land supply, reforming building norms, expanding rental housing, and improving financing options for both developers and buyers are key to this effort.
