A power of attorney is one of the most useful instruments in a property purchase and one of the most misused. Used correctly, it lets a trusted person act for you at the sub- registrar's office when you cannot be there yourself, which is how most overseas buyers and many busy resident ones complete a purchase. Used incorrectly, or presented as something it is not, it is at the centre of one of the most persistent frauds in Indian real estate. The difference between the two turns on understanding precisely what a power of attorney does and, more importantly, what it does not.
What it is, and what it is not
A power of attorney is a delegation of authority: it authorises the person named in it, the attorney, to do specified things on behalf of the person granting it, the principal. In a property context it typically authorises the attorney to sign documents, to appear before the sub-registrar, to admit execution of a deed, and to complete the formalities of a transaction the principal cannot attend in person. It is, in essence, a way of being present through someone else. What it is not is a transfer of ownership. This is the single most important thing to understand about it, and the misunderstanding of it causes more trouble than any other in this area. A power of attorney does not make the attorney the owner of anything; it merely lets them act for the principal. The principal remains the owner, the attorney is an agent, and the authority can, in the ordinary case, be revoked. Any arrangement that treats a power of attorney as if it transferred the property itself is misusing the instrument, and a buyer who is offered ownership through a power of attorney is being offered something the document cannot deliver.
General versus specific
There are broadly two kinds. A general power of attorney confers wide authority to act across many matters, while a specific or special power of attorney confers authority limited to a particular transaction or a defined set of acts. For a property purchase, a specific power of attorney is almost always the right instrument, because it authorises the attorney to do exactly what is needed for that one transaction and nothing more, which is both safer for the principal and clearer for everyone relying on it. The danger of a broad general power of attorney is precisely its breadth: it hands wide authority to another person, and if that person is not entirely trustworthy, or if the document falls into the wrong hands, the potential for misuse is large. A specific power of attorney, enumerating the exact powers granted and tied to the identified property and transaction, contains the risk. The discipline is to grant the narrowest authority that accomplishes the task, rather than a broad authority that is convenient but exposing, and to name the property and the acts precisely rather than in general terms.
Why it must be registered
A power of attorney to transfer property is a delegation of authority, not a transfer of ownership. Anyone offering you a house through a GPA sale is offering something the instrument cannot deliver. For a power of attorney that authorises dealing with immovable property, registration matters, and the reason is rooted in a well-known clarification by the Supreme Court that a sale through a general power of attorney does not convey title. That ruling was aimed squarely at the practice of transferring property through so-called GPA sales to avoid stamp duty and registration, and its effect is that a power of attorney is a means of acting for an owner, not a means of becoming one. A registered, specific power of attorney used to complete a genuine transaction is sound; a general power of attorney presented as the vehicle of the sale itself is not. The practical consequence for a buyer is twofold. First, ensure any power of attorney you grant or rely on is properly stamped and registered, because an unregistered instrument dealing with immovable property may not be effective for its purpose. Second, be deeply wary of buying a property where the seller's own claim to it rests on a general power of attorney rather than on a registered sale deed in their name, because that is exactly the defective chain the court's ruling was addressing. A seller whose title is a GPA rather than a deed does not have title in the way you need them to.
The overseas buyer's power of attorney
For a buyer abroad, a power of attorney is usually how the purchase is completed without a trip to India, and it deserves particular care because it is being executed in one country to be used in another. The instrument should be specific to the transaction, should enumerate the powers granted precisely, and must be executed in a form that Indian authorities will accept from abroad, which typically means execution before an Indian consulate or notarisation and apostille or consular attestation depending on the country, followed by the appropriate steps in India. A power of attorney casually drafted or improperly attested abroad can be rejected at exactly the moment it is needed. This is not an area to improvise. An overseas buyer should have the power of attorney drafted by their Indian lawyer to match precisely what the sub-registrar in the relevant district will require, and should follow the exact attestation and stamping procedure for the country of execution, because the requirements differ and a defect is discovered only when the document is presented. Done correctly, the power of attorney lets an overseas buyer complete a purchase remotely and safely; done carelessly, it fails at the counter and delays or derails the registration. The care taken in drafting and attesting it is repaid at the one moment it has to work.
Drafting it tightly
Whether resident or overseas, the drafting principle is the same: enumerate the powers, identify the property, and grant no more authority than the task requires. A well-drafted property power of attorney names the specific property by its survey or gat number, states the specific transaction, lists the specific acts the attorney may perform, and stops there. It does not grant open-ended authority to deal with the principal's affairs generally, because that breadth serves the attorney's convenience and the principal's risk, not the other way around. It should also address duration and revocation, so that the authority does not outlive its purpose. A power of attorney granted for a single purchase should, sensibly, be limited to that purchase and lapse or be revoked once the transaction is complete, rather than lingering as a live authority that could be misused later. The tighter the drafting, the smaller the window for anything to go wrong, and the drafting is entirely within the principal's control at the moment of granting it, which is the cheapest moment to get it right.
Revocation and how it ends
A buyer should understand how a power of attorney ends, because an authority that is thought to be alive when it is dead, or dead when it is alive, causes real problems. In the ordinary case a power of attorney can be revoked by the principal, and it generally ends on the death of the principal, since a dead person cannot be represented by an agent. There are exceptions, notably powers of attorney coupled with an interest, which are treated differently, but the general rule is that the authority is personal to the living principal and can be withdrawn. The practical significance is in the timing and the record. A revocation should be documented and, where the original was registered, communicated appropriately, so that third parties relying on the power know it is no longer good. And a buyer relying on someone else's power of attorney, for instance where a seller's representative is acting under one, should confirm it is still valid, unrevoked and covering the acts in question, rather than assuming a document produced today reflects a live authority. An expired or revoked power of attorney is worse than none, because it looks like authority and is not.
Stamp duty on the instrument itself
A power of attorney is not free of cost, and a buyer budgeting a purchase should account for it. The instrument itself attracts stamp duty, and where it deals with immovable property and is registered, registration charges apply too, with the amounts depending on the nature of the power granted and the state's schedule. A power of attorney granted to a family member for a single transaction is treated differently from certain other powers, and the duty is generally modest relative to the purchase, but it is a real cost that arrives with the instrument rather than at completion. The reason to mention it here is that an overseas buyer executing a power of attorney abroad has to navigate both the attestation in the country of execution and the stamping in India, and getting the stamping right is part of making the instrument valid for use. A power of attorney that is improperly stamped can be questioned at exactly the moment it is presented, so the small cost and the correct procedure are worth attending to in advance. As with so much of the buying process, the instrument that is prepared carefully and correctly stamped works silently when it is needed, while the one prepared casually fails at the counter.
The GPA-sale trap, spelled out
It is worth spelling out the specific trap that the misuse of powers of attorney creates, because it recurs and it is expensive. In the practice the courts curtailed, property was transferred not by a registered sale deed but by a bundle of documents including a general power of attorney, a will and an agreement, together loosely called a GPA sale, used to avoid stamp duty and registration. The problem is that this bundle does not convey title. A buyer who takes property this way does not become the legal owner, and their position is weak precisely where it should be strong. The lesson for a buyer is to look hard at how the seller themselves acquired the property. If the seller's own claim rests on a general power of attorney rather than on a registered sale deed in their name, the chain of title is defective at that link, and buying from them inherits the defect. A clean purchase requires that the seller holds registered title and conveys it to you by a registered sale deed, with any power of attorney used only to let a representative complete the formalities, not to substitute for the transfer itself. A seller offering title through a GPA is offering the very thing the courts held does not work, and the right response is to decline it rather than to hope it will be fine.
Who should hold it, and the developer's role
The person you appoint as your attorney should be someone you trust without reservation, because you are authorising them to act in your name in a transaction involving a great deal of money. For most buyers that is a close family member or a long-standing professional adviser, not a convenient acquaintance and certainly not someone connected to the seller. A power of attorney granted to a party with an interest on the other side of the transaction is a conflict waiting to happen, and it should be avoided. The developer's proper role here is narrow and supportive rather than central: to tell the buyer and their attorney what the sub-registrar in that district will require, and to guide the attorney through the appointment on the day, not to supply or hold the power of attorney themselves. Every Eko Estates purchase can be completed by a buyer's own registered attorney, and we will walk that attorney through the registration process and the district's specific requirements, but the instrument is drafted by the buyer's own lawyer and granted to a person of the buyer's own choosing. That separation is deliberate, because the power of attorney is the buyer's protection and should sit entirely on the buyer's side of the transaction. Keep it specific, keep it registered, grant it only to someone you trust completely, and it becomes exactly the useful, safe instrument it is meant to be rather than the risk it becomes when it is broad, casual or in the wrong hands.