BENGALURU: The Karnataka state government has announced major changes to the Rent Control Act of 1999, decriminalizing rental disputes while significantly increasing penalties, which may rise from 900% to 2,500%.
The cabinet approved these amendments last week, and they will be presented during the winter session of the legislature in Belagavi.
The amendments aim to align the state legislation with the central government’s Jan Vishwas Act, 2025, which decriminalizes minor offences while implementing penalties and warnings. Imprisonment clauses of up to one month related to rental disputes between tenants and landlords will be eliminated.
Under the new amendments, penalties for nine different violations of the Act will now consist of heavy fines. These violations include unauthorized subletting, illegal eviction of tenants, falsification of property details, and failure to register real estate agents with state-appointed rent controllers.
One clause specifies: “…any tenant found subletting, assigning, or otherwise transferring possession of any premises in violation of the law shall incur a penalty of up to Rs 50,000 or double the rent received for subletting, until the violation is resolved, whichever amount is higher (sic).”
Previously, this violation could result in a fine of Rs 5,000 or double the rent, along with the possibility of a one-month prison sentence or both.
Similar penalties apply to landlords who evict tenants unlawfully, particularly if a court has mandated that the original tenant be reinstated. Earlier, landlords faced fines of Rs 5,000 or double the rent collected after re-letting, alongside the potential for one month of imprisonment. Now, the fines can be as high as Rs 50,000 or double the rent, depending on which is higher, and imprisonment is no longer an option.
The amendments also target real estate agents and middlemen who fail to register with rent controllers. The government has removed imprisonment penalties for these defaults and instead has established a daily fine of Rs 20,000 until compliance is achieved.
A real estate agent from North Bengaluru noted, “While most agents linked with new properties have registered with RERA as channel partners, very few realize they also need to register with the government to resell these properties.”
The state has appointed assistant commissioners (ACs) within municipal limits and tahsildars in urban and rural areas as rent controllers, tasked with enforcing the Act. To help reduce the judiciary’s workload, these amendments grant rent controllers adjudication powers for rental disputes statewide.
