Taxmann's Registration Act 1908 [Bare Act without Comments | AIBE] – Complete Statutory Text with Section 17 on Compulsory Registration and Section 49 on the Effect of Non-registration

Registration Act 1908 [Bare Act without Comments] by Taxmann for the All India Bar Examination (AIBE) is the 2026 Edition of Act 16 of 1908, the Act passed, in the words of its own long title, to consolidate the enactments relating to the Registration of Documents. It received assent on 18th December 1908 and came into force on the first day of January 1909. The volume carries all fifteen Parts and all 96 section entries, covering sections 1 to 93 together with three lettered sections, and the Schedule, in 29 printed pages. It is published for the AIBE-XXII (22) cycle, whose paper is set for 29th November 2026. Section 17 lists the documents whose registration is compulsory. Section 49 states what happens to a document that needed registration and did not get it: in the section's own words it shall not affect any immovable property comprised therein, confer any power to adopt, or be received as evidence of any transaction affecting such property or conferring such power. The proviso that saves it as evidence in a suit for specific performance, and as evidence of a collateral transaction, is printed with the words the 2001 Act removed from it marked in place. Both sections carry the amendment record on the same page. The Registration and other Related Laws (Amendment) Act 2001, in force from 24th September 2001, reaches both of them and is recorded in seven footnotes. Three of its changes altered what has to be registered and how: Section 17(1A), inserted in 2001: a document containing a contract to transfer immovable property for consideration, for the purposes of section 53A of the Transfer of Property Act 1882, must be registered if executed on or after that commencement, and if it is not, it has no effect for section 53A at all Section 32A, inserted in 2001: every person presenting a document must affix a passport-size photograph and fingerprints, and where the document transfers ownership of immovable property, so must each buyer and seller named in it Section 16A, inserted in 2001: the register-books may be kept in computer floppies, diskettes or any other electronic form, and a copy given under the registering officer's hand and seal counts as a copy under section 57 Printed without notes, comments, annotations or commentary, the volume is in the form the Bar Council of India permits candidates to carry into the AIBE examination hall. The statutory text is freely available; what this edition supplies is that permitted form, the amendment record and the apparatus that makes a section quick to reach. The AIBE paper sets 100 questions in 3 hours 30 minutes, a little over two minutes a question. The Bar Council's syllabus names nineteen subjects and no individual statutes under most of them; the Registration Act falls within the property limb of Contract, Specific Relief, Property and Negotiable Instruments, a head carrying 8 of the 100 marks. Finding the section is answered by a five-page section-wise contents and by a section number in the running head on 28 of the 29 pages. Confirming that the words in front of you are the amended words is answered by 71 footnotes in a single run: sixty name the instrument behind the change, nine say ibid for the note above, one gives the date of assent and one points to a successor statute. This book is intended for the following audience: AIBE-XXII (22) Candidates—who sit the paper on 29th November 2026 and need the registration statute behind the property limb of a head worth 8 of the 100 marks Conveyancing and Property Lawyers—who settle sale deeds, gifts, leases and agreements to sell and need sections 17, 18 and 49, and the 2001 amendments that changed what must be registered and what an unregistered document is still good for Civil-side Litigators—who plead and resist section 53A part performance, where section 17(1A) decides whether the agreement was registrable and section 49 decides what it can still prove Sub-Registrars and Registration Officers—who work to Parts VI to XII on presentation, enquiry, endorsement, refusal and appeal, with section 32A on photographs and fingerprints as the 2001 Act left it Final-year Law Students—taking property law and conveyancing, where this Act sits between the Transfer of Property Act and the Stamp Act Coaching Institutes and Law Libraries—stocking the Act for the AIBE cycle alongside the Indian Contract Act on the same head The Present Publication is the 2026 Edition, carrying the amended and updated text of the Registration Act 1908, published in Taxmann's Bare Act without Comments series for the AIBE, with the following noteworthy features: [Permitted Form] Printed without notes, comments, annotations or commentary, in the form the Bar Council of India permits candidates to carry into the examination hall [Complete Act] All fifteen Parts and all 96 section entries, covering sections 1 to 93 together with three lettered sections, and the Schedule [The 2001 Amendment Section by Section] Seven footnotes for the Registration and other Related Laws (Amendment) Act 2001, in force from 24th September 2001, including section 17(1A) on section 53A agreements, section 32A on photographs and fingerprints and section 16A on electronic register-books [The Act's Own Name Recorded] The word “Indian” was dropped from the short title by the Indian Registration (Amendment) Act 1969 with effect from 26th December 1969, and the omission is footnoted where it happened [The Latest Change Dated] The words “except the State of Jammu and Kashmir” removed from the extent clause by the Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation Act 2019, with effect from 31st October 2019 [Updated & Amended] 71 footnotes in a single numbered run, naming sixteen instruments from the Decentralisation Act 1914 to the Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation Act 2019, forty of them giving the day the change took effect [Superseded Wording Quoted] Forty-two footnotes set out in quotation marks the words the amendment replaced or removed, so the earlier reading is recoverable without a second book [Omissions Kept in Place] Sections 4, 9, 56, 67, 92 and 93 and the Schedule are each carried as a bracketed line naming the instrument that removed them, in the contents as well as the body [Section-wise Contents] A five-page contents listing every section entry by number, marginal heading and page under its Part [Running Heads] A section number in the running head on 28 of the 29 pages, so a reference given as a section number is found by turning rather than by reading The structure of the book is as follows: The volume opens with a five-page section-wise contents, then the long title, the preamble and the Act Parts run I to XV, from Preliminary and the Registration-establishment through Registrable Documents, the Time of Presentation, the Place of Registration, Presenting Documents, Enforcing the Appearance of Executants and Witnesses, Presenting Wills and Authorities to Adopt, the Deposit of Wills, the Effects of Registration and Non-registration, the Duties and Powers of Registering Officers, and Refusal to Register, to Fees, Penalties and Miscellaneous Sections run under their marginal headings, with inserted and substituted matter set in square brackets and keyed to the footnote that records it Section 16A, section 23A and section 32A are the three lettered sections, inserted by the 2001 Act, the Indian Registration (Amendment) Act 1917 and the 2001 Act respectively Sections 4, 9, 56, 67, 92 and 93 stand as bracketed omitted entries naming the instrument that removed them Footnotes sit at the foot of the page in one numbered run from 1 to 67, with five letter-suffixed labels, 11a, 14a, 20a, 52a and 59a The Schedule, headed Repeal of enactments, is itself carried as omitted by the Repealing Act 1938, and closes the text on printed page 29 Read more