Section 22A and the Dharani Prohibited List: Checking a Hyderabad Plot Before You Pay

In October 2026 a software engineer in Kokapet found a plot that looked perfect. The price was fair, the survey number was on the agreement, and the seller had photographs of a boundary wall. He paid a token advance and booked a slot at the sub-registrar office. On the day of registration the official opened the record, pointed at a single line that read marked prohibited for transaction, and closed the file. The sale could not go ahead. The buyer had done everything except the one check that takes five minutes and costs nothing.

The short answer. Section 22A of the Registration Act, 1908 lets the Telangana registration department list certain land as prohibited, and a sub-registrar is barred from registering a sale, gift or mortgage of anything on that list. You can check any survey number for free on the Dharani portal before you pay. The trade off is simple: five minutes of checking against the risk of paying lakhs for a deed that can never be registered.

What is Section 22A, and why does it stop a sale?

Section 22A instructs the sub-registrar not to register a transaction on land that the state has placed on the prohibited list. It does not by itself cancel ownership. As the public guides explain, you can remain the owner on paper yet be unable to transfer the parcel through registration while the entry stands. For true government, endowment or wakf land the state holds the ownership, so the bar reflects who actually owns the land. For other categories the bar is a protective freeze while a dispute or classification is sorted out. Either way, the practical effect on a buyer is the same. Without registration you do not get legal title, you cannot raise a home loan against the property, and you cannot apply for permanent water or power connections in your name.

This is why the prohibited check sits at the very start of a purchase, not the end. A clean looking agreement, a boundary wall and even an old sale deed in the seller's name do not override a current 22A entry. The register is what the sub-registrar reads on the day, and that is what decides whether your money buys a title or buys a problem.

It also helps to understand why the state built this filter. For decades, assigned land meant for the landless poor, surplus land taken under ceiling laws, and temple and wakf land were quietly sold on to unsuspecting buyers through plausible looking paperwork. By tagging those survey numbers at the registration stage, the state tries to stop the fraud at the single point where a transfer becomes legal. The system is blunt, and it catches some innocent parcels, but the logic is to protect public land and weaker owners rather than to trouble ordinary buyers.

Which properties land on the prohibited list?

Five broad categories can be marked under Section 22A in Telangana. According to the published guidance on the Telangana list, they are: land whose transfer is barred by another law, which includes assigned land given to the landless poor; government land; endowment and wakf property; surplus land above the ceiling limit; and land prohibited by a specific government order. The last category is the loose one, because a parcel can be added after a district level report and a public notification, and that is where most disputes begin.

For a buyer the label matters less than the status. What you need to know is what each result on the portal means for your purchase, so you can decide whether to proceed, pause or walk away. A parcel can also carry a partial entry, where only a slice of a larger survey number is flagged, so always match the extent on the record to the exact plot you are buying rather than the whole survey.

How do I check the Dharani portal before I pay?

You check it yourself, free, before any advance changes hands. The official routes are the Dharani portal at dharani.telangana.gov.in for agricultural parcels and registration.telangana.gov.in for the registration department lists, both searchable by district, mandal and village. The steps below work for most residential plot checks in the Hyderabad region.

1. Collect the exact survey number, village, mandal and district from the seller's agreement and from the latest sale deed.
2. Open the Dharani portal, or registration.telangana.gov.in for an urban parcel, and find the prohibited property search.
3. Select the district, then the mandal, then the village from the drop down menus.
4. Enter the survey number and the captcha, then fetch the result for that parcel.
5. Read the status line carefully for any wording that marks the parcel as prohibited for transaction.
6. Cross check the owner name and extent shown against the seller's documents so the record and the plot match.
7. Save or screenshot the result with the date, and repeat the check close to your registration day because lists are updated.

If you are also verifying ownership history, run this alongside an encumbrance certificate rather than instead of one. Our guide on how to check a Telangana property record and encumbrance certificate on Dharani walks through that second layer.

What if my plot is on the list by mistake?

Wrong entries are common enough that the state has publicly promised to fix them. Press reporting through 2025 and 2026 described large numbers of genuinely private parcels being swept onto the prohibited list, and the state government saying it would provide relief for honest cases. That reporting is useful context, but it does not change the rule at the counter: while the entry stands, the sub-registrar will not register your deed. So treat a prohibited tag on a plot you believe is private as a reason to pause, not a technicality to ignore.

The correction path generally runs through the revenue authorities rather than the sub-registrar, and it can take time. The safe sequence for a buyer is to get the position in writing from the sub-registrar office, let the seller pursue the deletion, and hold back full payment until the record is clear. Paying the whole price against a promise that the tag will come off later puts your money ahead of your title, which is exactly the wrong order.

If you still want to go ahead with such a plot, structure the deal so that your exposure is small until the entry is gone. A modest, refundable advance held in a clearly written agreement, with a deadline for the seller to clear the record and a full refund clause if they fail, keeps you in control. Vague promises, large cash advances and a seller who pushes you to register quickly before the next list update are the warning signs that the tag is unlikely to come off at all.

How the prohibited check fits with your other title checks

The 22A check answers one question only: will the state allow this parcel to be registered at all. It does not tell you whether the layout is approved, whether the project is registered with the regulator, or whether the chain of ownership is clean. A plot can clear the prohibited list and still sit in an unapproved layout, so you still need the approval and title checks that apply to any Hyderabad purchase. Buyers who prefer to avoid open plot risk altogether often move to a regulator registered apartment such as DSR Ciel in Gopanpally, where approvals and registration status are easier to confirm in one place.

Think of the checks as a sequence, each one able to stop the deal on its own. The prohibited list tells you whether the state will register the parcel. The encumbrance certificate tells you whether the title is free of loans and prior sales. The layout or building approval tells you whether you can legally construct and connect utilities. And the regulator registration tells you whether a promoter selling plots or flats is accountable for what was promised. Skipping any one of them is how buyers who checked three things out of four still end up in trouble.

Once the prohibited check is clear, the registration itself is a documented process. If you are new to it, our walkthrough of the Telangana property registration process and documents explains what the sub-registrar will ask for on the day and what you should carry.

Frequently asked questions

Does Section 22A mean the seller does not own the land?

Not necessarily. Section 22A stops the sub-registrar from registering a transfer, but the seller may still be the owner on paper. For genuine government, assigned, endowment or wakf land the state holds ownership, so you must read the record before you assume either way.

Can I buy a plot that shows as prohibited if the price is low?

No, you should not. While the entry stands, the sub-registrar will not register your sale deed, so you cannot get legal title, a loan or utility connections. A low price usually reflects that blocked status, not a bargain, so treat a prohibited tag as a reason to stop.

How do I check the prohibited list in Telangana for free?

Open the Dharani portal or registration.telangana.gov.in, choose the district, mandal and village, and enter the survey number. The record shows whether the parcel is marked prohibited for transaction. Do this before you pay any advance, because the check costs nothing and takes only a few minutes.

My plot is on the list but it is clearly private. What now?

Many genuinely private parcels were added in error, and the state has said it will correct wrong entries. You generally need a formal correction through the revenue authorities before registration reopens, so get written guidance from the sub-registrar office and do not pay full consideration until the entry is removed.

Last updated 2026-10-07. PropNewz Team.