The registration itself takes an hour. Weeks later, the bank asks for "the Index II" before it releases the next tranche, the housing society asks for it before admitting you as a member, and years after that your own buyer's lawyer asks for it before anything else. Most buyers have never seen the document when these requests arrive, and some assume it is the deed they already have. It is a single page, and it is worth understanding before the first person asks for it.
Key takeaways
- Index II is the entry the sub-registrar creates for your document in the property index kept under section 55 of the Registration Act, 1908.
- It summarises the registered document on one page: number, date, office, nature of document, parties, property, consideration, market value and the duty paid.
- IGR Maharashtra registered 17.21 lakh documents between April and July 2026, nearly 9 lakh of them rental agreements, and every one that concerns property, rental agreements included, gets an Index II entry.
- It proves a document was registered. It does not prove the seller had title, and it shows nothing registered afterwards.
- Download it from IGR Maharashtra's e-search; for older documents or a certified copy, apply at the sub-registrar office.
Neha is asked for a page she does not have
Neha (illustrative, as our stories always are) registered her agreement for sale on a 2BHK in a Mulund redevelopment project, collected her original deed from the sub-registrar, and considered the paperwork done. Her bank's next email asked for "a copy of Index II" before it would disburse against the agreement. Her first reaction was that she had already sent the agreement.
She had. The bank wanted something different: the office's own summary of what had been registered, which it could check against its records without reading forty pages of agreement. She downloaded it the same evening. Names and numbers in this story are illustrative.
What Index II is
Every registration office in India keeps four indexes of the documents it registers, under section 55 of the Registration Act, 1908. Index No. I is the index of persons: who executed a document and who claims under it. Index No. II is the index of property: for each registered document, the particulars of the land or flat it deals with. The one-page extract of your document's entry in that index is what everyone calls "Index II", or suchi 2.
Because it is created by the registering office rather than by either party, it carries a weight the parties' own copies do not. It is the state's record that a document of a particular kind, between particular people, about a particular property, was registered on a particular day.
An analogy: the library catalogue card
A library's catalogue card does not contain the book. It tells you the library holds a book with that title, by that author, on that shelf, and it is the fastest way to prove the book exists and to find it.
Index II is the catalogue card for your document. The registered agreement is the book, with every term and schedule in it. The card is what a bank, a society or a lawyer checks first, because it is short, it is official, and it points to exactly where the full document sits.
What each line tells you
- 1
Document number, year and office
The registration number and the sub-registrar office. Together they locate the full document, and they are what you quote when you ask for a certified copy.
- 2
Nature of the document
Agreement for sale, conveyance, gift, leave and licence, mortgage. On an under-construction purchase you will see an agreement for sale, not a conveyance, because the flat has been agreed to be sold rather than transferred.
- 3
Parties
Who executed the document and who claims under it. The names should match the agreement exactly, including the co-owners, because a later transfer will be traced from these names.
- 4
Property description
The village, the survey or CTS number, and the flat or unit with its area. This is what links your document to the land records and to every later search on the same property.
- 5
Consideration and market value
The price in the document and the government's valuation used for stamp duty. Duty is charged on the higher of the two, so this pair is where an under-valued transaction shows.
- 6
Stamp duty and registration fee
What was paid. A lender and a future buyer read this line to confirm the document was properly stamped, because an under-stamped document is a problem that travels with the property.
Source: Section 55 of the Registration Act, 1908, and the Index II extract format issued by IGR Maharashtra
How much is registered, and why that matters
The index is not a rarely used ledger. It is the busiest record in the state's property system.
Source: IGR Maharashtra figures as reported by Punekar News, 6 August 2026
Two things follow for a buyer. First, every one of those documents that concerns property has an Index II entry, and that includes rental agreements. A search on a property can therefore turn up registered leave and licence agreements beside the sales, which is normal and says nothing about ownership. Second, the scale is why the index matters: in Mumbai alone, IGR recorded 80,221 property registrations in the first half of 2026, according to Knight Frank's analysis of IGR data. When that many transactions are recorded each year, the index is how anyone finds the one they need.
How to get it
For a document registered in the online era, the e-search facility on the IGR Maharashtra website offers free and paid searches by property details, such as district, village and survey or CTS number, or by document number. The online archive covers documents from around 2002 in most offices and from earlier years in some, including Mumbai.
For an older document, or where an institution wants a certified copy rather than a printout, apply to the sub-registrar office that registered it, quoting the document number and year. A certified copy carries a small stamp fee and a per-page copying charge, and it takes days rather than minutes.
Download your Index II the week you register, while the details are fresh, and check every line against your agreement: the names, the flat number, the area and the consideration. A spelling error or a wrong unit number is a quick correction in the first month and a slow one years later, when a buyer's lawyer finds it.
Where buyers get it wrong
Treating it as the deed. Index II summarises the document. It does not contain the terms, the schedules or the payment plan. Keep the original registered agreement; the index entry points to it and does not replace it.
Using it to prove the seller's title. An Index II shows that a document was registered. It does not show that the person who signed it had the right to sell, and it says nothing about what happened to the property afterwards. A title search reads the whole chain, which is why it sits in the twelve documents to check alongside the index, not instead of it.
Stopping at the first entry. A search that finds a sale deed has found one link. An encumbrance certificate looks across the years for everything registered against the property, including mortgages and later transfers.
Missing the market value line. If the consideration on the index is far below the market value, the stamp duty was paid on the market value, which is correct, but the gap is worth understanding before you pay a price close to the higher figure. How the two figures interact is worked through in stamp duty and registration charges.
Forgetting the society. A resale transfer is not finished at the sub-registrar. The society will want the deed and the Index II before admitting you, the second step covered in the share certificate and society membership.
Where it sits in the purchase
The index entry is created on registration day, the morning walked through in registration day at the sub-registrar. For an under-construction flat, the entry records an agreement for sale between you and the promoter, which is the document your lender is funding against, as explained in the home loan on an under-construction flat.
What the index cannot show is anything about the project behind the transaction: whether the building is on schedule, whether the promoter has a pattern of extensions, whether complaints have been filed. Those are filed with MahaRERA, not with the sub-registrar. For any covered Maharashtra project, the Rs 499 ReraGenie buyer report reads that record: the promoter's other registrations against their promised dates, this project's extension history with the reasons filed, and its complaints and litigation with case numbers. Start with the project's free page before you are asked for your Index II, not after.
The one-line summary
Index II is the sub-registrar's one-page catalogue entry for your registered document: download it the week you register, check every line against your agreement, and remember that it proves a document was registered, not that anyone had the right to sign it.
Evaluating a project right now?
The ReraGenie buyer report reads every filing for one project and sets out the red flags, the checks that came back clear and what to verify before you book, each fact with its filing date. Rs 499, one time.
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