Transfer of Property

Allahabad High Court: A Scheduled Tribe Land Sale Can Fail Because of the Buyer's Lost Tribal Status, Not Just the Seller's

Deciding nine connected writ petitions arising from land purchases made between 2012 and 2016 in Sonbhadra district, the Allahabad High Court has held that a statutory restriction on transferring Scheduled Tribe land to non-tribal buyers is not satisfied merely because the purchaser was born into the tribe and holds a caste certificate — she must also show she retained her tribal identity on the date of each purchase, and a prolonged, undisclosed change of religious and social identity can defeat that claim even years after the sale deeds were registered.