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Mukhtiarnama-e-Aam (General Power of Attorney — Management Only, No Power to Sell Immovable Property)

At a glance

Price
₹399 · GST included
Stamp duty
Stamp duty on a power of attorney is charged under entry 48 of Schedule I-A to the Indian Stamp Act, 1899, and Schedule I-A stands differently in Punjab from the way it stands in the Union Territory of Chandigarh.
Registration
Registration of this deed is NOT compulsory.
Witnesses
No statute imposes a general two-witness rule on a power of attorney.

₹399

GST included

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Also called

  • General Power of Attorney
  • GPA
  • General POA
  • Power of Attorney Deed
  • Mukhtiarnama-e-Aam
  • Mukhtarnama-e-Aam
  • Aam Mukhtarnama
  • Aam Mukhtiarnama

Whether you can fill this in here

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You can fill this one in on this site, and read the whole draft on screen before you decide anything about it. It is a carefully drafted template; it is not advice about your own facts.

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Why you need it

When you need it

This is the Mukhtiarnama-e-Aam that an absentee owner gives to someone at home so that the ordinary business of a house, a plot or a holding does not stop because the owner is not in the country. It lets your attorney pay the land revenue and the house tax, appear before the Halqa Patwari and the Tehsildar, get an inheritance mutation entered in the jamabandi, collect rent from a tenant, keep the electricity and water connections alive, keep an encroacher off the land, and defend a suit filed against you. It deliberately does NOT let your attorney sell, mortgage, gift, exchange or long-lease any immovable property of yours. That omission is the whole point of the document. One honest qualification to that, because the deed says it four times and a reader is entitled to know where it is not absolute. The exclusion is an exclusion of the power to sell IMMOVABLE PROPERTY. There is exactly one sale power this deed can carry, it is optional, and it reaches no land: if you choose the second option under "Shares, securities and mutual funds", the attorney may buy and sell shares, units and securities in your existing accounts, with every rupee of proceeds credited to your own bank account and no security ever put into the attorney's name. Choose the first option there, or leave that question blank, and the deed authorises no sale of anything at all. Excluding the power to sell property is the cheapest fraud-prevention step a Doaba family can take, and it is also the cheapest document. In Punjab, item (f) of entry 48 of Schedule I-A to the Indian Stamp Act, 1899, as substituted by the Indian Stamp (Punjab Amendment) Act, 2023 (Punjab Act No. 2 of 2024, gazetted 15 January 2024), charges 2% of the consideration or of the Collector rate, whichever is higher, on a power of attorney that authorises the attorney to SELL immovable property where the attorney is not a family member. In the Union Territory of Chandigarh the equivalent charge is higher still and it is not limited to a stranger: the Administration's published rates table charges a general power of attorney carrying the power to sell at 3% of the value or the consideration, whichever is higher. A power that authorises no sale of immovable property enters neither. You pay the plain fixed figure instead — Rs 2,000 in Punjab, Rs 75 in Chandigarh, on the sources and with the caveats set out under Stamping — and, far more importantly, nobody standing at a Sub-Registrar's window in Jalandhar, Hoshiarpur, Nawanshahr or Kapurthala with your Mukhtiarnama in hand can execute a sale deed of your land with it, because the document on its face says they cannot. Use this deed if you are eighteen or over, of sound mind, own or have an interest in property or affairs in Punjab or in the Union Territory of Chandigarh, and are appointing an individual you trust completely — typically a brother, a son, a mother or a cousin who lives in the village or the town where the property is. It is drafted so that it can be signed abroad before an Indian Consul or Vice-Consul, or before a Notary Public with an apostille, and then stamped in India within three months of first receipt here under section 18 of the Indian Stamp Act, 1899. ONE DEED PER OWNER. This template is written for a single Principal acting for that person's own share and no more. It has one name, one age, one address and one signature block, and it cannot be made to carry two executants. Where a khewat is held jointly — and in the Doaba most ancestral khewats are — each co-sharer who wants an attorney must instruct a separate Mukhtiarnama of their own. Do not add a second brother's name to this one by hand: the signing form the deed prescribes in clause 3.4 names one Principal, and an attorney who deals with the whole khasra on the strength of one brother's Mukhtiarnama is acting outside it. Do NOT use it to sell. It grants no power to sell immovable property at all, and even a deed that did grant one would convey nothing: in Suraj Lamp & Industries Ltd. v. State of Haryana, decided on 11 October 2011 and reported at (2012) 1 SCC 656, the Supreme Court held that the sale-agreement plus general-power-of-attorney plus will method transfers no title, and that an interest in immovable property passes only under a duly stamped and registered conveyance. If you genuinely intend to sell, instruct a registered sale deed, or a special power of attorney limited to that one sale — and budget for the 2% under item (f) in Punjab if the attorney is not your spouse, child, parent, sibling, grandparent or grandchild, or for the flat 3% in Chandigarh whoever the attorney is. Do NOT use it if you are already losing mental capacity. India has no enduring or lasting power of attorney; section 201 of the Indian Contract Act, 1872 ends the agency the moment the principal becomes of unsound mind, and guardianship is the route instead. Do NOT use it for a court appearance alone — a vakalatnama does that job. Do NOT use it to authorise a company's officer; a board resolution does that. Do NOT use it where the principal is a minor, a company, a Hindu Undivided Family acting as such, or a trustee acting for a trust. And do NOT use it where you need only one narrow job done, such as getting a single mutation sanctioned: a special power of attorney is cheaper to stamp — Rs 1,000 in Punjab, Rs 15 in Chandigarh on the same published tables — and very much safer to hand over. One warning for Chandigarh in particular. If your property is an allotted or leasehold site in a Chandigarh sector, the Estate Officer's allotment file is the title — there is no jamabandi for it — and a transfer needs the Estate Office's own prior permission under Rule 7 of the Chandigarh Estate Rules, 2007 and, on a leasehold site, payment of one-third of the unearned increase. Following the Supreme Court's judgment of 10 January 2023 in Residents Welfare Association v. Union Territory of Chandigarh, SLP(C) Nos. 4950 and 5489 of 2022, the Deputy Commissioner-cum-Estate Officer's Public Notice effective 10 February 2023 permits the transfer and mutation of a residential unit only within a short list of categories, pending the decision of the Chandigarh Heritage Conservation Committee, and whether that decision has since been taken was not established for this template. This deed will let your attorney run the file, reply to a notice and pay the demands; it will not, and cannot, get a transfer through on its own.

See stamp duty, registration and witnesses

What follows is written for Punjab and Chandigarh. It states the position there rather than describing how it varies, so the amounts below are the ones that apply — worth confirming at the sub-registrar’s office, because rates change. If the property is anywhere else in India, none of this is yours.

Stamp duty

Stamp duty on a power of attorney is charged under entry 48 of Schedule I-A to the Indian Stamp Act, 1899, and Schedule I-A stands differently in Punjab from the way it stands in the Union Territory of Chandigarh. Read the block below for the place you picked on the form; the other block is not your position. Because this deed grants no power to sell immovable property, it is the cheap version of the instrument in both places, and it is cheap by a very large margin. PUNJAB. Item (f) of entry 48, as substituted by the Indian Stamp (Punjab Amendment) Act, 2023 — Punjab Act No. 2 of 2024, assented 1 January 2024, published in the Punjab Government Gazette (Extraordinary) on 15 January 2024 and in force from publication — charges 2% of the consideration, or of the Collector rate for the property mentioned in the instrument, whichever is higher, on a power of attorney authorising the attorney to SELL immovable property where the attorney is not a family member. The Note to item (f) defines family member as spouse, child, parent, sibling, grandparent and grandchild. This deed authorises no sale of immovable property to anybody, so item (f) does not touch it and the 2% is not payable. What is payable in Punjab is the plain figure, and it is now taken from the department's own table rather than from a website. The Government of Punjab, Department of Revenue, Rehabilitation and Disaster Management publishes "Document wise detail of Stamp Duty, Registration Fee and Facilitation charges" on revenue.punjab.gov.in, and that table, retrieved on 6 September 2026, prices a general power of attorney at Rs 2,000 where up to five persons are concerned and Rs 4,000 where more than five are, with a registration fee of Rs 400 and facilitation charges of Rs 2,000; it prices a special power of attorney at Rs 1,000 with a registration fee of Rs 100, cancellation of a general power at Rs 1,000 with a registration fee of Rs 400, and cancellation of a special power at Rs 500. This deed is given by one person to one attorney, or at most two, so it never leaves the "up to five persons" line: Rs 2,000 is the figure, and Rs 4,000 cannot arise on this template. That table carries no date and no notification number on its face, so treat it as the department's current publication rather than as a dated notification, and put the figure to the counter of the Sub-Registrar or Joint Sub-Registrar of the tehsil in which the property lies, or to the Deputy Commissioner as Collector of Stamps, before you buy the paper. How the paper is bought in Punjab. Rs 2,000 sits well below the Rs 49,999 line above which Stock Holding Corporation of India Ltd, the Central Record Keeping Agency, issues the e-Stamp certificate, so buy non-judicial stamp paper from the licensed vendor at the tehsil complex, or an e-Stamp certificate where the counter offers one; ask the Sub-Registrar's office which it wants before you go. Buy it in the Principal's own name — a certificate in a stranger's name is a defect. Registration, where you choose to register, runs on Easy Registry, the Punjab instance of the National Generic Document Registration System, at easyregistry.punjab.gov.in, live in the Sub-Registrar and Joint Sub-Registrar offices of all twenty-two districts, and the e-stamp is locked against the document at registration so that it cannot be re-used. Do not buy the paper months in advance: by Revenue Department circular No. 07/15/2026-ST-2(PF-1)/10837 dated 11 July 2026, an e-Stamp Certificate left unlocked for more than four months is locked and an e-Registration Receipt left unlocked for more than one month is locked, with unlocking a case-by-case exercise. An absentee owner who buys the stamp on a visit in January and signs abroad in July will find that out at the counter. No Collector rate figure has to be worked out anywhere on this deed, because nothing in it is charged ad valorem. If you ever replace it with a deed that does authorise a sale, the base is the Collector rate for the revenue estate concerned, fixed by the Deputy Commissioner as Collector and revised with effect from 1 April each year, published district-wise; there is no single Punjab figure and the district table is the only source. CHANDIGARH. The Punjab amending Act of 2024 is an Act of the Punjab State Legislature. A change to Schedule I-A as it applies to the Union Territory comes by notification of the Ministry of Home Affairs and not by a Punjab Act, so the 2% sale-power charge does not run in Chandigarh at all. Do not read that as meaning a sale power is cheap here: the Union Territory has its own charge and it is higher. The Chandigarh Administration's published "Rates of Stamp Duty & Registration Fees" table charges a general power of attorney WITH power to sell at 3% of the value of the property or the consideration, whichever is higher, with a registration fee of Rs 50; a special power of attorney with power to sell at the same 3%; a plain general power of attorney at Rs 75, or Rs 150 where the power is given for or by more than five persons; and a plain special power of attorney at Rs 15. The registration fee on a general power of attorney of either kind is Rs 50, on a special power Rs 25, and a pasting fee of Rs 20 is charged on every document — the Rs 20 is small and it is the line people forget at the window. Cancellation of a general power of attorney is Rs 15 with a registration fee of Rs 50, which is worth knowing before you register, because a registered power needs a registered revocation. This deed carries no power to sell immovable property and is given by one person to at most two, so it is the Rs 75 line, and the Rs 150 line cannot arise on this template. That table is the source and it needs its caveat carried with it every time it is quoted: it is the Chandigarh Administration's published document-wise table at chandigarh.gov.in/files/2021updoc/dc19-stampduty.pdf, created as a PDF on 17 May 2020, bearing no notification number and no date on its face, still the live link from the Administration's Land and Property page when it was read on 6 September 2026. Treat Rs 75, Rs 50 and Rs 20 as the Administration's published rates, not as a current notification, and confirm them at the counter of the Sub-Registrar, UT Chandigarh, 30 Bays Building, Sector 17, before you execute. How the paper is bought in Chandigarh. A Rs 75 stamp is one of the very few Chandigarh instruments a citizen can actually e-stamp online: issue of an e-Stamp certificate through e-Sampark at sampark.chd.nic.in is bulk purchase for banks, with a ceiling of Rs 500 for an individual citizen, and Rs 75 sits comfortably inside it. Otherwise buy physical non-judicial stamp paper from an authorised stamp vendor, who issues up to Rs 50,000; above that the route is the Central Treasury, UT Chandigarh with the duty deposited at the State Bank of India, Treasury Branch, Sector 17 near KC Cinema, which no version of this deed will ever need. WHEN TO STAMP, IN BOTH PLACES. If the deed is signed in India, stamp it before or at the time of execution — section 17 of the Indian Stamp Act, 1899. If it is signed abroad, section 18(1) allows it to be stamped within three months after it is first received in India, and section 18(2) lets the attorney take it to the Collector within that same three months where a private person cannot stamp it. Diarise the date the courier lands. Miss the three months and section 35 bites hard: an unstamped instrument is inadmissible in evidence and no public officer may act upon it, which means the Naib Tehsildar will not read it and the bank will not honour it, and the deed will then have to be adjudicated under sections 31 and 32 with penalty. Stamping is not, however, a condition of the agency coming into existence — clause 7.1 of the deed says so in terms, and section 35 goes to admissibility and to what a public officer may act on, not to whether the appointment was ever made.

Registration

Registration of this deed is NOT compulsory. A power of attorney is not in the list in section 17(1) of the Registration Act, 1908, and no Punjab amendment to section 17 adding a power of attorney has been traced; because this deed authorises no sale, the question that troubles a sale-power Mukhtiarnama does not arise here at all. Registration is nevertheless worth the money, and for one concrete reason: a deed registered with the Sub-Registrar goes onto a record that a buyer, a bank or a patwari can search, and it gives you a place to register the revocation later, so that the revocation is found by the same search that finds the power. An unregistered Mukhtiarnama can be quietly revoked and quietly not revoked, and in a dispute nobody can tell which. THE CLOCK THE THREE-MONTH STAMPING RULE HIDES. If you decide to register, there is a second and different period, and missing it is the ordinary trap for a deed signed abroad. Section 23 of the Registration Act, 1908 requires a document to be presented for registration within four months from the date of its execution. Section 26 is the provision that saves a foreign-executed document: where a document purporting to have been executed by all or some of the parties outside India is not presented within that time, the registering officer may nevertheless accept it if it is presented within four months after its arrival in India and he is satisfied that it was in fact executed outside India. If that period too is missed, section 25 allows the Registrar, on application, to direct registration within a further four months on payment of a fine of up to ten times the proper registration fee. The section 18 stamping clock and the section 26 registration clock both run from the day the deed arrives in India, so one diary entry covers both: the day the courier lands. Do not diarise from the signing date, which is the mistake that produces a refusal at the counter in the fifth month. WHERE AND WHAT IT COSTS. In Punjab, at the Sub-Registrar or Joint Sub-Registrar of the tehsil in which the property lies, booked on Easy Registry, the Punjab instance of the National Generic Document Registration System, at easyregistry.punjab.gov.in, live in every Sub-Registrar and Joint Sub-Registrar office across the twenty-two districts. The Revenue Department's document-wise table, retrieved 6 September 2026, gives the registration fee for a general power of attorney as Rs 400 with facilitation charges of Rs 2,000; that table carries no date and no notification number, so confirm it at the counter when you book. In Chandigarh, at the Sub-Registrar, UT Chandigarh, 30 Bays Building, Sector 17; the Administration's published table shows the registration fee for a general power of attorney at Rs 50 plus the Rs 20 pasting fee (that table was created as a PDF on 17 May 2020, carries no notification number and no date on its face, and was read on 6 September 2026 — confirm it at the counter). The Chandigarh counter keeps narrow hours: documents are presented between 12.00 noon and 1.00 pm, registration is done between 3.00 pm and 5.00 pm, and documents are returned one week after presentation between 9.00 and 11.00 am. Three things that office's own requirement list asks for on a deed of this kind, and they are cheap to get wrong: the deed goes in DUPLICATE (only a sale deed of freehold urban property goes in triplicate); the photographs of the executant and of the claimant are affixed on the deed itself; and proof of ownership of property is one of the very few things NOT demanded on a power of attorney, so do not let a clerk send you away for a title document this instrument does not need. WHAT THE ATTORNEY WILL BE ASKED FOR LATER, AT THE SAME CHANDIGARH COUNTER. When your Attorney afterwards presents or signs any deed there on your behalf, the Sub-Registrar's requirement list calls for a copy of this power of attorney together with an affidavit stating that the executant of the power of attorney is still alive and that the power is still valid and has not been cancelled or revoked by the executant. Tell your Attorney that now. It is a sworn statement about you, made in your absence, and an attorney who turns up without it loses the appointment. SECTION 33 IS THE PROVISION THAT MATTERS FOR AN ABSENTEE OWNER. Whether or not you register this deed, the moment your attorney takes any document to a registration counter under section 32, section 33(1)(c) of the Registration Act, 1908 governs the power of attorney the attorney produces. Where the principal does not reside in India, that power 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". In G. Kalawathi Bai v. G. Shashikala, 2025 INSC 851, decided 15 July 2025, the Supreme Court held that this authentication is required even where the attorney both executes and presents the document, because the attorney remains the principal's agent in both capacities. Section 33(1)(c) names a Notary Public as sufficient, and India has been party to the Hague Apostille Convention since 2005, so an apostilled notarised Mukhtiarnama should be legally adequate — but Sub-Registrar offices are widely reported to insist on attestation by the Indian Mission, no Punjab Revenue Department circular either way was found, and the safe course for an NRI is therefore to execute before the Indian Consul or Vice-Consul at the Mission with jurisdiction over the place of residence. Where the attorney presents a document for registration, section 32A requires the attorney's passport photograph and fingerprints as well. THE RENT FORUM, AND WHY THIS DEED NAMES FOUR LABELS FOR IT. If the attorney is to defend or bring a tenancy matter, the authority the attorney appears before is not a settled name in either jurisdiction, and a deed that names only one of them invites an objection to the attorney's standing. In Punjab, the Punjab Rent Act, 1995 gives jurisdiction to a Rent Authority appointed by the State Government by notification under sub-section (1) of section 36; no section 36 notification could be located for this template, and in practice such applications are filed in the Court of the Rent Controller-cum-Civil Judge (Junior Division) at the district courts — so the two may be the same officer wearing the statutory label, or the old Rent Controller courts may simply have continued. In the Union Territory of Chandigarh the East Punjab Urban Rent Restriction Act, 1949, extended to the Union Territory by Central Act No. 54 of 1974, governs, and its forum is the Rent Controller; but as at 6 September 2026 it does so under an interim order rather than undisturbed. A tenancy enactment in force elsewhere in India was extended to the Union Territory by a notification of the Ministry of Home Affairs dated 6 May 2026 issued under section 87 of the Punjab Reorganisation Act, 1966, and the Punjab and Haryana High Court kept that notification in abeyance by an interim order dated 29 May 2026, directing that the 1949 Act continue. The position after 30 May 2026 was not verified and must be re-checked before anything is filed. That is why the litigation power in this deed names the Rent Controller, the Rent Controller-cum-Civil Judge (Junior Division) and any Rent Authority, Rent Court or Rent Tribunal constituted under the rent legislation for the time being in force where the property lies: whichever of those the officer who actually sits turns out to be, the attorney's authority reaches it. MUTATION IS NOT REGISTRATION. Registering this deed does nothing to the jamabandi. A mutation (intiqal) in Punjab is reported to the patwari and sanctioned by the Naib Tehsildar or Tehsildar as Assistant Collector second grade under sections 34 to 37 of the Punjab Land Revenue Act, 1887, and in Chandigarh a sector property is mutated on the Estate Officer's allotment file, where mutation has been auto-triggered from the Sub-Registrar since 2025, so the affidavit pack must be correct at the registration counter itself.

Notarisation

Notarise this deed in every case, before a notary appointed under the Notaries Act, 1952 and holding a current certificate of practice. The presumption of due execution that section 85 of the Indian Evidence Act, 1872 gave to a power of attorney executed before and authenticated by a notary public, a court, a magistrate or an Indian consular officer is carried forward in the Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam, 2023, the 1872 Act having been repealed with effect from 1 July 2024. That presumption is the practical reason a bank manager in Ludhiana or a clerk at the Estate Office accepts the document without calling you back. IF YOU ARE SIGNING ABROAD, notarisation is not enough on its own and authentication is not optional. Take one of two routes. The safer route: attend the Indian Embassy, High Commission or Consulate with jurisdiction over where you live, sign the deed in the presence of the Indian Consul or Vice-Consul, and have the consular officer authenticate it — this squarely satisfies section 33(1)(c) of the Registration Act, 1908 and is what a Punjab Sub-Registrar is most likely to accept without argument. The alternative route: sign before a local Notary Public and have the notary's signature and seal apostilled by the competent authority of that country under the Hague Apostille Convention. Section 33(1)(c) names a Notary Public as sufficient and the apostille route should be legally adequate, but counters have been reported refusing it, so if the deed is going to be used at a registration window, choose the consular route. ONE EXTRA STEP IF THE PROPERTY IS A CHANDIGARH SECTOR SITE. A document prepared or executed outside India that is to be used in an Estate Office transaction must, on arrival, be embossed by the Office of the Finance Department, Chandigarh Administration before the Estate Office will act on it. Consular authentication or an apostille does not replace that embossing, and the embossing does not replace the stamping. Build all three into the timetable, and ask the Estate Office counter what it wants to see before the deed is couriered rather than after. Notarisation and consular authentication are never a substitute for stamping. A perfectly attested Mukhtiarnama that has not been stamped within three months of first receipt in India is still hit by section 35 of the Indian Stamp Act, 1899 and no public officer may act on it. Notarisation is also not a substitute for registration where you have chosen to register, and it does not cure a defect in the deed's contents. Practical points that save a second trip: sign in blue ink; sign every page, not only the last; affix your passport photograph in the space provided and cross-sign it; put your left or right thumb impression alongside the signature (Punjab counters ask for it routinely and the Mission usually will too); and get the Attorney's specimen signature onto the deed before it is attested, because sending it back for that is a month lost.

Witnesses

No statute imposes a general two-witness rule on a power of attorney. It is not a will under section 63 of the Indian Succession Act, 1925 and it is not a gift under section 123 of the Transfer of Property Act, 1882, both of which do require attestation by two witnesses. In practice, sign this deed before two independent adult witnesses in every case, because the offices that will read it expect them. Who they must not be: the Attorney, the Attorney's spouse, the second Attorney, anyone who takes a benefit under the deed, and anyone who is a party to a tenancy or a dispute the Attorney is being asked to handle. Who they should be: two adults of sound mind who know you, who can be traced later, and who are willing to be summoned. Record each witness's full name, parentage, complete address and the identity document produced — an Aadhaar, passport, PAN or voter card number — and have each of them sign in the space at the foot of the deed. IF YOU ARE REGISTERING IN CHANDIGARH, THE FIRST WITNESS IS NOT ANY ADULT. The Sub-Registrar, UT Chandigarh requires two witnesses on all deeds and requires the first of them to qualify under paragraph 127 of the Punjab Registration Manual — in practice a Lambardar, Sarpanch or Member Panchayat for a document from a rural area, or a councillor, a gazetted officer or an advocate. Both witnesses must be known to each other and the first must be known to the Sub-Registrar. Line that person up before you take the appointment; a first witness who does not qualify sends the whole party home with the duty already paid. At a Punjab Sub-Registrar's office on Easy Registry, and at the Sub-Registrar, Sector 17, Chandigarh, the executant's and the witnesses' photographs and thumb impressions are captured at the counter under section 32A of the Registration Act, 1908, so the witnesses must physically attend if the deed is being registered there. If the deed is executed abroad before an Indian Consul or Vice-Consul, it is the consular authentication that carries the deed under section 33(1)(c), but the Mission will normally still ask for two witnesses at the signing and will want their identity documents; check the requirement published by the particular Mission before you attend, since the paperwork one Mission asks for differs from the next. Where the Attorney will later do something that itself requires attestation — presenting an instrument that must be attested by two witnesses, for example — those witnesses are a separate requirement of that instrument and are not satisfied by the witnesses to this deed. Nothing the Attorney is authorised to do under this deed transfers immovable property, so no attestation of a transfer arises out of it.

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Sample preview — placeholder answers, not your data

MUKHTIARNAMA-E-AAM
GENERAL POWER OF ATTORNEY — MANAGEMENT ONLY, WITH NO POWER TO SELL IMMOVABLE PROPERTY

READ THIS BEFORE SIGNING

This deed hands your signature to another person. Everything the Attorney does within the powers below binds you exactly as if you had done it yourself.

This deed carries NO power to sell immovable property. The Attorney cannot sell, agree to sell, mortgage, gift, exchange, partition, relinquish or long-lease any land, house, plot or flat of yours, cannot take an earnest money or a sale advance, and cannot hand possession to a buyer or a financier. That is deliberate. It is the reason this deed is cheap to stamp and safe to leave in the country while you are not in it. Do not let anyone add a sale power to it by hand.

There is exactly one sale power this deed can ever carry, and it is not over property. If — and only if — you choose the second option under "Shares, securities and mutual funds", the Attorney may buy and sell shares, units and securities in your existing accounts, with every rupee of the proceeds credited to your own bank account and no security put into the Attorney's name. If you did not choose that option, this deed authorises no sale of anything at all.

Even a Mukhtiarnama that did grant a power to sell land would transfer nothing. In Suraj Lamp & Industries Ltd. v. State of Haryana, decided on 11 October 2011 and reported at (2012) 1 SCC 656, the Supreme Court held that the sale-agreement, general-power-of-attorney and will method of transferring immovable property conveys no title, and that title passes only under a duly stamped and registered deed of conveyance. Nobody should buy from, or lend against, a power of attorney treated as though it were a sale deed.

Never sign a blank page or a blank stamp paper. Keep the original in your own custody and give the Attorney an attested copy unless the original is genuinely needed at a counter. Put an expiry date on it. Revoke it in writing the day it is no longer needed.

THIS DEED OF GENERAL POWER OF ATTORNEY (MUKHTIARNAMA-E-AAM) is executed on 1 April 2026 at Vancouver, Canada, and relates to my affairs and to my property situated in Punjab.

1. Parties

1.1 The Principal — Gurmeet Singh Sandhu, son of Sardar Joginder Singh, son of Sardar Bachan Singh, aged 25,000 years, resident of X, identified by Indian passport Z1234567 (referred to in this deed as "the Principal", "I", "me" and "my").

1.2 The Attorney — Harpreet Singh Sandhu, son of Sardar Joginder Singh, aged 25,000 years, resident of X, identified by Aadhaar-linked PAN AACPS5678L. Relationship to me: Spouse.

1.3 Second Attorney — X, X, aged 25,000 years, resident of X, is appointed together with the person named in clause 1.2. In this deed "the Attorney" means each of them, and the two of them are to act in the manner I have recorded here and in no other: Both attorneys must act jointly; neither of them may act alone.

1.4 One Principal, and one only. This deed is executed by one person, for that person's own rights, and it can carry no more. Where land, a house or a plot is held jointly — and in the Doaba most ancestral khewats are — every co-sharer who wants an attorney must execute a separate Mukhtiarnama of their own. A co-sharer who has not signed a deed is not bound by this one, and nothing done under this deed touches that co-sharer's share.

2. Why I am making this deed

2.1 I execute this deed of my own free will, without coercion, fraud or undue influence, and after understanding its effect. I am of sound mind, and my age is the figure written against my name in clause 1.1. Section 183 of the Indian Contract Act, 1872 permits only a person who has attained the age of majority according to the law to which he is subject, and who is of sound mind, to employ an agent. If the age written in clause 1.1 is under eighteen, this deed creates no agency whatever and must not be signed; a guardian dealing with a minor's property needs separate advice and, for immovable property, the permission of the competent court.

2.2 I am unable, or find it inconvenient, to attend personally to the matters described in this deed. In particular: I have been employed in Canada since 2011 and cannot attend personally to the land and the house at Nurmahal.

2.3 I ordinarily reside in India and I am executing this deed in India, and it is being stamped before or at the time of execution.

2.4 I therefore nominate, constitute and appoint the Attorney to be my true and lawful attorney — mera sacha te kanooni mukhtiar — to do in my name and on my behalf only the acts set out under the headings "Powers granted" and "Immovable property — management only", subject to the limits set out under the headings "What this deed does not do", "Immovable property — management only" and "Absolute limits, and the exclusion of the power to sell immovable property".

3. What this deed does not do

3.1 This deed transfers nothing. It creates an agency and no more. It does not sell, convey, assign, gift or otherwise transfer any interest in any property of mine to the Attorney or to anybody else, and no person may treat it, or any receipt or agreement produced with it, as a conveyance. Following Suraj Lamp & Industries Ltd. v. State of Haryana, (2012) 1 SCC 656, an interest in immovable property passes only under a duly stamped and registered instrument of transfer.

3.2 Nothing in this deed gives the Attorney any beneficial interest in any asset of mine. The Attorney holds any money, document, key or title paper of mine that comes into the Attorney's hands for me alone, as a mere custodian.

3.3 The Attorney cannot do anything that I could not lawfully do myself, and has no authority in relation to any asset greater than my own share or right in it. Where I hold land jointly with others, the Attorney's authority extends to my share alone and to nothing belonging to any other co-sharer.

3.4 Every act must be done in my name and expressed to be so. The Attorney shall sign as: "Gurmeet Singh Sandhu, by Harpreet Singh Sandhu, constituted attorney", and the Second Attorney shall sign as: "Gurmeet Singh Sandhu, by X, constituted attorney"; where both are required to act jointly, each shall sign in that form on the same instrument. A signature by the Attorney in the Attorney's own name alone does not bind me.

3.5 No entry in the Attorney's own name. The Attorney has no authority to procure, consent to or acquiesce in any mutation, khata, allotment, re-allotment or record entry that shows the Attorney, or any relative or associate of the Attorney, as the owner, allottee or person in possession of any property of mine. Every entry the Attorney applies for must continue to show me as the owner.

3.6 This deed does not replace the forms and formalities of any bank, Sub-Registrar, Tehsildar, Estate Office, depository, court or government office. It supports them.

4. Powers granted

4.1 I authorise the Attorney to do the following in my name, and nothing beyond them:

Everyday and administrative matters — to receive, open and reply to letters and communications addressed to me, to collect documents, certificates, cards and parcels on my behalf, to pay bills, land revenue, house tax, ground rent, maintenance and statutory dues out of funds I make available, and to sign the applications, receipts, acknowledgements and know-your-customer forms those acts require.

Banking — to operate my existing bank accounts in India, including my NRO account, sign and countersign cheques, drafts and instructions, deposit and withdraw money, present and collect cheques, transfer funds between my own accounts, and obtain statements, passbooks and certificates — but not to open or close any account, not to place or break fixed deposits, not to borrow, and not to repatriate any money out of India. The Attorney must first complete the bank's own mandate, verification and know-your-customer formalities; this deed does not oblige any bank to act on it. Money in an NRE, NRO or FCNR(B) account remains subject to the conditions of the Foreign Exchange Management Act, 1999 and the RBI Master Directions made under it, and no power in this deed authorises the Attorney to remit any money out of India.

Revenue, estate and municipal offices — to represent me before the Halqa Patwari, the Field Kanungo, the Naib Tehsildar and the Tehsildar as Assistant Collectors of the second grade, and before the Collector, the Commissioner and the Financial Commissioner (Revenue), to report an acquisition of right to the patwari and to apply for, pursue, object to and seek correction of any mutation (intiqal) under sections 34 to 37 of the Punjab Land Revenue Act, 1887, to inspect the jamabandi, the roznamcha and the register of mutations and to obtain a certified fard or nakal from the Fard Kendra or the Sewa Kendra, to apply for a Fard Badar where an entry is wrong, to appear at a girdawari, to pay the land revenue and every other due assessed on my holding, and to deal with the municipal, electricity, water and sewerage authorities in respect of house tax, assessment, connections and transfers of connections. In Punjab the record is inspected free at https://jamabandi.punjab.gov.in/ and the certified fard or nakal is issued at the tehsil counter; in Chandigarh the Estate Officer's allotment file is the record and there is no jamabandi for a sector property, though the villages and the lal dora and phirni areas within the Union Territory are dealt with on a fard and a Naib Tehsildar's report in the ordinary way.

Income tax and goods and services tax — to represent me before the income-tax authorities, to sign, verify and file my returns of income, forms, statements, appeals, replies and rectification applications, to apply for a certificate for deduction of tax at a lower rate or at nil rate on sums payable to me, to respond to notices and attend assessment and appellate proceedings, and to receive any refund only into my own bank account. The e-filing portal runs its own authorised-representative mechanism and that mechanism does not operate on this deed; the Attorney has to be added on the portal separately, and a deductor, registrar or depository may require its own form as well.

Courts, revenue courts, rent forums and complaints — to appear and act for me before any civil court, revenue court, tribunal, forum, arbitrator, commission or authority, and before the Rent Controller, the Rent Controller-cum-Civil Judge (Junior Division) and any Rent Authority, Rent Court or Rent Tribunal constituted under the rent legislation for the time being in force where the property lies, to sign and verify plaints, written statements, petitions, applications, appeals and affidavits, to engage advocates and sign vakalatnamas, to give evidence of facts within the Attorney's own knowledge, to lodge a written complaint with the police including with a notified NRI police station of the Punjab Police NRI Wing, to file and pursue a complaint before the Punjab State Commission for Non-Resident Indians, and to receive money decreed or awarded in my favour into my own bank account and give a valid discharge for it. The Attorney may depose only to facts within the Attorney's own personal knowledge, and a separate vakalatnama must be filed for any advocate engaged. The Punjab State Commission for Non-Resident Indians, constituted under the Punjab State Commission for Non-resident Indians Act, 2011 (Punjab Act No. 33 of 2011, notified in the Punjab Gazette on 29 November 2011), has the powers of a civil court for summoning witnesses, taking evidence and requisitioning records, but what it issues is a recommendation and it is not binding on the police or on the administration; it is not a substitute for a suit.

Business — to represent me in my proprietary business, sign purchase orders, invoices, delivery challans and contracts of supply or service in the ordinary course of that business, and deal with its licences, registrations and renewals.

What this document is for

An absentee owner — most often an NRI — gives this to someone at home so that ordinary property business does not stall just because the owner is out of the country. It lets the attorney pay land revenue and house tax, deal with the Halqa Patwari and the Tehsildar, get an inheritance mutation entered, collect rent from a tenant, keep utility connections alive, keep an encroacher off vacant land, and defend a suit filed against the owner.

What it deliberately does not do is let the attorney sell, mortgage, gift, exchange or long-lease any immovable property belonging to the owner — that exclusion is the whole design of this particular deed, not an oversight. The one narrow, optional exception never touches land: the attorney may buy and sell shares and mutual fund units in your existing accounts, with every rupee credited straight back to your own bank account.

Stamp paper and registration

Stamp paper needed

Yes

Typical stamp duty — Punjab

Rs 2,000, for a deed given to one or two attorneys — the higher Rs 4,000 band only applies above five people, which this document, drafted for at most two attorneys, cannot reach. A further Rs 400 registration fee and Rs 2,000 facilitation charges apply if you choose to register. Because this deed carries no power to sell property, Punjab's 2% ad-valorem charge on a sale-power power of attorney does not apply. Source: the Punjab Revenue Department's fee table, checked 6 September 2026.

Typical stamp duty — Chandigarh

Ask us — The Chandigarh Administration's published table prices a plain power of attorney with no power to sell at Rs 75 (Rs 150 for more than five attorneys), and that figure is likely right. But the source template flags the reasoning behind it as unverified: it rests on the premise that a Punjab State Act cannot change how this instrument is charged in the Union Territory, and only a notification from the Ministry of Home Affairs could — sound in principle, but the current Chandigarh entry 48 text itself was never actually obtained to confirm it.

Registration at the Sub-Registrar

No — Not compulsory — a power of attorney is not on the list of documents section 17 of the Registration Act, 1908 requires to be registered. It is still worth doing: a registered deed sits on a record a bank, a buyer or a patwari can search, and it gives you a place to register the revocation later so the same search finds both.

Notary or witnesses

Notarise it in every case — that is what gives a bank manager or an Estate Office clerk the confidence to act on it without calling the principal back. Signing outside India needs one further step: attestation by the Indian Consulate or High Commission is the safer route, since counters have been known to query an apostille alone. Two witnesses attend in every case, and in Chandigarh the first one must fit the same qualifying class the Sub-Registrar checks for on any deed.

What you will need before you start

  • The Principal's and the Attorney's (and any second attorney's) full details — identity document, address, and how they are related to you
  • Where you are signing — in India, or abroad before an Indian Mission or a local notary — since that decides which execution route applies
  • A clear idea of which powers you actually want to hand over: everyday and administrative, banking, property management, revenue, tax, or litigation — this deed lets you choose rather than granting a fixed bundle
  • Whether you want the authority to expire automatically on a set date, rather than running indefinitely until revoked
  • Two witnesses' names and addresses

Common mistakes

  • Assuming this document lets the attorney sell the property — it deliberately does not, and the deed exists precisely to leave that power out.
  • Signing abroad and treating notarisation alone as enough — a Sub-Registrar can still query it without the further step section 33 of the Registration Act, 1908 asks for from a principal who lives outside India.
  • Forgetting the clock on a deed executed abroad: stamping is due within three months of the document first reaching India, and the registration window runs from that same date, not from the day it was signed.

Questions people ask before using this document

Can a general power of attorney be used to sell my property in Punjab or Chandigarh?

Not this one. This document is drafted specifically to exclude the power to sell, mortgage, gift, exchange or long-lease any immovable property — that exclusion is the point of it, not a gap in it. An actual sale needs either the owner signing the Sale Deed personally, or a different, specific power of attorney that expressly grants the power to sell and is priced and stamped very differently because of it.

Does a general power of attorney need to be registered?

No, not compulsorily — it does not appear on the list of documents the Registration Act, 1908 requires to be registered. Many people register it anyway, because a registered deed goes onto a public record that a bank, buyer or government office can search, which also gives you somewhere to register the revocation later.

How much stamp duty does a general power of attorney attract in Punjab?

Rs 2,000, for a deed given by one person to up to two attorneys with no power to sell property — the published departmental figure, current as checked in September 2026. A deed that does carry a power to sell immovable property is charged very differently, at 2% of the value where the attorney is not a family member, which is a different document from this one.

What if I am signing this power of attorney from outside India?

Sign it before the Indian Consulate, High Commission or Embassy with jurisdiction over where you live — the route most likely to be accepted without argument at a Sub-Registrar's counter back home. Then diarise the day the document actually lands in India: it must be stamped within three months of that date, and if you register it, the four-month registration window runs from the same day, not from the day you signed.

Can I cancel a power of attorney after I have given it?

Yes — a power of attorney can be revoked at any time by a separate revocation deed. If the original power was registered, register the revocation too, so that anyone searching the record for the power of attorney finds the cancellation in the same place rather than relying on the attorney, or the people they dealt with, to have heard about it.

Related documents, and when you would need them

Questions about this document

Does the Mukhtiarnama-e-Aam (General Power of Attorney — Management Only, No Power to Sell Immovable Property) need stamp paper or stamp duty in Punjab and Chandigarh?

Stamp duty on a power of attorney is charged under entry 48 of Schedule I-A to the Indian Stamp Act, 1899, and Schedule I-A stands differently in Punjab from the way it stands in the Union Territory of Chandigarh. Read the block below for the place you picked on the form; the other block is not your position. Because this deed grants no power to sell immovable property, it is the cheap version of the instrument in both places, and it is cheap by a very large margin.

PUNJAB. Item (f) of entry 48, as substituted by the Indian Stamp (Punjab Amendment) Act, 2023 — Punjab Act No. 2 of 2024, assented 1 January 2024, published in the Punjab Government Gazette (Extraordinary) on 15 January 2024 and in force from publication — charges 2% of the consideration, or of the Collector rate for the property mentioned in the instrument, whichever is higher, on a power of attorney authorising the attorney to SELL immovable property where the attorney is not a family member. The Note to item (f) defines family member as spouse, child, parent, sibling, grandparent and grandchild. This deed authorises no sale of immovable property to anybody, so item (f) does not touch it and the 2% is not payable.

What is payable in Punjab is the plain figure, and it is now taken from the department's own table rather than from a website. The Government of Punjab, Department of Revenue, Rehabilitation and Disaster Management publishes "Document wise detail of Stamp Duty, Registration Fee and Facilitation charges" on revenue.punjab.gov.in, and that table, retrieved on 6 September 2026, prices a general power of attorney at Rs 2,000 where up to five persons are concerned and Rs 4,000 where more than five are, with a registration fee of Rs 400 and facilitation charges of Rs 2,000; it prices a special power of attorney at Rs 1,000 with a registration fee of Rs 100, cancellation of a general power at Rs 1,000 with a registration fee of Rs 400, and cancellation of a special power at Rs 500. This deed is given by one person to one attorney, or at most two, so it never leaves the "up to five persons" line: Rs 2,000 is the figure, and Rs 4,000 cannot arise on this template. That table carries no date and no notification number on its face, so treat it as the department's current publication rather than as a dated notification, and put the figure to the counter of the Sub-Registrar or Joint Sub-Registrar of the tehsil in which the property lies, or to the Deputy Commissioner as Collector of Stamps, before you buy the paper.

How the paper is bought in Punjab. Rs 2,000 sits well below the Rs 49,999 line above which Stock Holding Corporation of India Ltd, the Central Record Keeping Agency, issues the e-Stamp certificate, so buy non-judicial stamp paper from the licensed vendor at the tehsil complex, or an e-Stamp certificate where the counter offers one; ask the Sub-Registrar's office which it wants before you go. Buy it in the Principal's own name — a certificate in a stranger's name is a defect. Registration, where you choose to register, runs on Easy Registry, the Punjab instance of the National Generic Document Registration System, at easyregistry.punjab.gov.in, live in the Sub-Registrar and Joint Sub-Registrar offices of all twenty-two districts, and the e-stamp is locked against the document at registration so that it cannot be re-used. Do not buy the paper months in advance: by Revenue Department circular No. 07/15/2026-ST-2(PF-1)/10837 dated 11 July 2026, an e-Stamp Certificate left unlocked for more than four months is locked and an e-Registration Receipt left unlocked for more than one month is locked, with unlocking a case-by-case exercise. An absentee owner who buys the stamp on a visit in January and signs abroad in July will find that out at the counter.

No Collector rate figure has to be worked out anywhere on this deed, because nothing in it is charged ad valorem. If you ever replace it with a deed that does authorise a sale, the base is the Collector rate for the revenue estate concerned, fixed by the Deputy Commissioner as Collector and revised with effect from 1 April each year, published district-wise; there is no single Punjab figure and the district table is the only source.

CHANDIGARH. The Punjab amending Act of 2024 is an Act of the Punjab State Legislature. A change to Schedule I-A as it applies to the Union Territory comes by notification of the Ministry of Home Affairs and not by a Punjab Act, so the 2% sale-power charge does not run in Chandigarh at all. Do not read that as meaning a sale power is cheap here: the Union Territory has its own charge and it is higher. The Chandigarh Administration's published "Rates of Stamp Duty & Registration Fees" table charges a general power of attorney WITH power to sell at 3% of the value of the property or the consideration, whichever is higher, with a registration fee of Rs 50; a special power of attorney with power to sell at the same 3%; a plain general power of attorney at Rs 75, or Rs 150 where the power is given for or by more than five persons; and a plain special power of attorney at Rs 15. The registration fee on a general power of attorney of either kind is Rs 50, on a special power Rs 25, and a pasting fee of Rs 20 is charged on every document — the Rs 20 is small and it is the line people forget at the window. Cancellation of a general power of attorney is Rs 15 with a registration fee of Rs 50, which is worth knowing before you register, because a registered power needs a registered revocation. This deed carries no power to sell immovable property and is given by one person to at most two, so it is the Rs 75 line, and the Rs 150 line cannot arise on this template.

That table is the source and it needs its caveat carried with it every time it is quoted: it is the Chandigarh Administration's published document-wise table at chandigarh.gov.in/files/2021updoc/dc19-stampduty.pdf, created as a PDF on 17 May 2020, bearing no notification number and no date on its face, still the live link from the Administration's Land and Property page when it was read on 6 September 2026. Treat Rs 75, Rs 50 and Rs 20 as the Administration's published rates, not as a current notification, and confirm them at the counter of the Sub-Registrar, UT Chandigarh, 30 Bays Building, Sector 17, before you execute.

How the paper is bought in Chandigarh. A Rs 75 stamp is one of the very few Chandigarh instruments a citizen can actually e-stamp online: issue of an e-Stamp certificate through e-Sampark at sampark.chd.nic.in is bulk purchase for banks, with a ceiling of Rs 500 for an individual citizen, and Rs 75 sits comfortably inside it. Otherwise buy physical non-judicial stamp paper from an authorised stamp vendor, who issues up to Rs 50,000; above that the route is the Central Treasury, UT Chandigarh with the duty deposited at the State Bank of India, Treasury Branch, Sector 17 near KC Cinema, which no version of this deed will ever need.

WHEN TO STAMP, IN BOTH PLACES. If the deed is signed in India, stamp it before or at the time of execution — section 17 of the Indian Stamp Act, 1899. If it is signed abroad, section 18(1) allows it to be stamped within three months after it is first received in India, and section 18(2) lets the attorney take it to the Collector within that same three months where a private person cannot stamp it. Diarise the date the courier lands. Miss the three months and section 35 bites hard: an unstamped instrument is inadmissible in evidence and no public officer may act upon it, which means the Naib Tehsildar will not read it and the bank will not honour it, and the deed will then have to be adjudicated under sections 31 and 32 with penalty. Stamping is not, however, a condition of the agency coming into existence — clause 7.1 of the deed says so in terms, and section 35 goes to admissibility and to what a public officer may act on, not to whether the appointment was ever made.

Does the Mukhtiarnama-e-Aam (General Power of Attorney — Management Only, No Power to Sell Immovable Property) need registration in Punjab and Chandigarh?

Registration of this deed is NOT compulsory. A power of attorney is not in the list in section 17(1) of the Registration Act, 1908, and no Punjab amendment to section 17 adding a power of attorney has been traced; because this deed authorises no sale, the question that troubles a sale-power Mukhtiarnama does not arise here at all. Registration is nevertheless worth the money, and for one concrete reason: a deed registered with the Sub-Registrar goes onto a record that a buyer, a bank or a patwari can search, and it gives you a place to register the revocation later, so that the revocation is found by the same search that finds the power. An unregistered Mukhtiarnama can be quietly revoked and quietly not revoked, and in a dispute nobody can tell which.

THE CLOCK THE THREE-MONTH STAMPING RULE HIDES. If you decide to register, there is a second and different period, and missing it is the ordinary trap for a deed signed abroad. Section 23 of the Registration Act, 1908 requires a document to be presented for registration within four months from the date of its execution. Section 26 is the provision that saves a foreign-executed document: where a document purporting to have been executed by all or some of the parties outside India is not presented within that time, the registering officer may nevertheless accept it if it is presented within four months after its arrival in India and he is satisfied that it was in fact executed outside India. If that period too is missed, section 25 allows the Registrar, on application, to direct registration within a further four months on payment of a fine of up to ten times the proper registration fee. The section 18 stamping clock and the section 26 registration clock both run from the day the deed arrives in India, so one diary entry covers both: the day the courier lands. Do not diarise from the signing date, which is the mistake that produces a refusal at the counter in the fifth month.

WHERE AND WHAT IT COSTS. In Punjab, at the Sub-Registrar or Joint Sub-Registrar of the tehsil in which the property lies, booked on Easy Registry, the Punjab instance of the National Generic Document Registration System, at easyregistry.punjab.gov.in, live in every Sub-Registrar and Joint Sub-Registrar office across the twenty-two districts. The Revenue Department's document-wise table, retrieved 6 September 2026, gives the registration fee for a general power of attorney as Rs 400 with facilitation charges of Rs 2,000; that table carries no date and no notification number, so confirm it at the counter when you book. In Chandigarh, at the Sub-Registrar, UT Chandigarh, 30 Bays Building, Sector 17; the Administration's published table shows the registration fee for a general power of attorney at Rs 50 plus the Rs 20 pasting fee (that table was created as a PDF on 17 May 2020, carries no notification number and no date on its face, and was read on 6 September 2026 — confirm it at the counter). The Chandigarh counter keeps narrow hours: documents are presented between 12.00 noon and 1.00 pm, registration is done between 3.00 pm and 5.00 pm, and documents are returned one week after presentation between 9.00 and 11.00 am. Three things that office's own requirement list asks for on a deed of this kind, and they are cheap to get wrong: the deed goes in DUPLICATE (only a sale deed of freehold urban property goes in triplicate); the photographs of the executant and of the claimant are affixed on the deed itself; and proof of ownership of property is one of the very few things NOT demanded on a power of attorney, so do not let a clerk send you away for a title document this instrument does not need.

WHAT THE ATTORNEY WILL BE ASKED FOR LATER, AT THE SAME CHANDIGARH COUNTER. When your Attorney afterwards presents or signs any deed there on your behalf, the Sub-Registrar's requirement list calls for a copy of this power of attorney together with an affidavit stating that the executant of the power of attorney is still alive and that the power is still valid and has not been cancelled or revoked by the executant. Tell your Attorney that now. It is a sworn statement about you, made in your absence, and an attorney who turns up without it loses the appointment.

SECTION 33 IS THE PROVISION THAT MATTERS FOR AN ABSENTEE OWNER. Whether or not you register this deed, the moment your attorney takes any document to a registration counter under section 32, section 33(1)(c) of the Registration Act, 1908 governs the power of attorney the attorney produces. Where the principal does not reside in India, that power 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". In G. Kalawathi Bai v. G. Shashikala, 2025 INSC 851, decided 15 July 2025, the Supreme Court held that this authentication is required even where the attorney both executes and presents the document, because the attorney remains the principal's agent in both capacities. Section 33(1)(c) names a Notary Public as sufficient, and India has been party to the Hague Apostille Convention since 2005, so an apostilled notarised Mukhtiarnama should be legally adequate — but Sub-Registrar offices are widely reported to insist on attestation by the Indian Mission, no Punjab Revenue Department circular either way was found, and the safe course for an NRI is therefore to execute before the Indian Consul or Vice-Consul at the Mission with jurisdiction over the place of residence. Where the attorney presents a document for registration, section 32A requires the attorney's passport photograph and fingerprints as well.

THE RENT FORUM, AND WHY THIS DEED NAMES FOUR LABELS FOR IT. If the attorney is to defend or bring a tenancy matter, the authority the attorney appears before is not a settled name in either jurisdiction, and a deed that names only one of them invites an objection to the attorney's standing. In Punjab, the Punjab Rent Act, 1995 gives jurisdiction to a Rent Authority appointed by the State Government by notification under sub-section (1) of section 36; no section 36 notification could be located for this template, and in practice such applications are filed in the Court of the Rent Controller-cum-Civil Judge (Junior Division) at the district courts — so the two may be the same officer wearing the statutory label, or the old Rent Controller courts may simply have continued. In the Union Territory of Chandigarh the East Punjab Urban Rent Restriction Act, 1949, extended to the Union Territory by Central Act No. 54 of 1974, governs, and its forum is the Rent Controller; but as at 6 September 2026 it does so under an interim order rather than undisturbed. A tenancy enactment in force elsewhere in India was extended to the Union Territory by a notification of the Ministry of Home Affairs dated 6 May 2026 issued under section 87 of the Punjab Reorganisation Act, 1966, and the Punjab and Haryana High Court kept that notification in abeyance by an interim order dated 29 May 2026, directing that the 1949 Act continue. The position after 30 May 2026 was not verified and must be re-checked before anything is filed. That is why the litigation power in this deed names the Rent Controller, the Rent Controller-cum-Civil Judge (Junior Division) and any Rent Authority, Rent Court or Rent Tribunal constituted under the rent legislation for the time being in force where the property lies: whichever of those the officer who actually sits turns out to be, the attorney's authority reaches it.

MUTATION IS NOT REGISTRATION. Registering this deed does nothing to the jamabandi. A mutation (intiqal) in Punjab is reported to the patwari and sanctioned by the Naib Tehsildar or Tehsildar as Assistant Collector second grade under sections 34 to 37 of the Punjab Land Revenue Act, 1887, and in Chandigarh a sector property is mutated on the Estate Officer's allotment file, where mutation has been auto-triggered from the Sub-Registrar since 2025, so the affidavit pack must be correct at the registration counter itself.

What does the Mukhtiarnama-e-Aam (General Power of Attorney — Management Only, No Power to Sell Immovable Property) cost on Kaagazaat?

₹399, GST included.

Launch period: downloads are free for now. The prices shown apply once payments open.

Does the Mukhtiarnama-e-Aam (General Power of Attorney — Management Only, No Power to Sell Immovable Property) need witnesses?

No statute imposes a general two-witness rule on a power of attorney. It is not a will under section 63 of the Indian Succession Act, 1925 and it is not a gift under section 123 of the Transfer of Property Act, 1882, both of which do require attestation by two witnesses. In practice, sign this deed before two independent adult witnesses in every case, because the offices that will read it expect them.

Who they must not be: the Attorney, the Attorney's spouse, the second Attorney, anyone who takes a benefit under the deed, and anyone who is a party to a tenancy or a dispute the Attorney is being asked to handle. Who they should be: two adults of sound mind who know you, who can be traced later, and who are willing to be summoned. Record each witness's full name, parentage, complete address and the identity document produced — an Aadhaar, passport, PAN or voter card number — and have each of them sign in the space at the foot of the deed.

IF YOU ARE REGISTERING IN CHANDIGARH, THE FIRST WITNESS IS NOT ANY ADULT. The Sub-Registrar, UT Chandigarh requires two witnesses on all deeds and requires the first of them to qualify under paragraph 127 of the Punjab Registration Manual — in practice a Lambardar, Sarpanch or Member Panchayat for a document from a rural area, or a councillor, a gazetted officer or an advocate. Both witnesses must be known to each other and the first must be known to the Sub-Registrar. Line that person up before you take the appointment; a first witness who does not qualify sends the whole party home with the duty already paid.

At a Punjab Sub-Registrar's office on Easy Registry, and at the Sub-Registrar, Sector 17, Chandigarh, the executant's and the witnesses' photographs and thumb impressions are captured at the counter under section 32A of the Registration Act, 1908, so the witnesses must physically attend if the deed is being registered there. If the deed is executed abroad before an Indian Consul or Vice-Consul, it is the consular authentication that carries the deed under section 33(1)(c), but the Mission will normally still ask for two witnesses at the signing and will want their identity documents; check the requirement published by the particular Mission before you attend, since the paperwork one Mission asks for differs from the next.

Where the Attorney will later do something that itself requires attestation — presenting an instrument that must be attested by two witnesses, for example — those witnesses are a separate requirement of that instrument and are not satisfied by the witnesses to this deed. Nothing the Attorney is authorised to do under this deed transfers immovable property, so no attestation of a transfer arises out of it.

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