K Narayanan Nair learned the lesson of his life the hard way. The retired schoolteacher from Malayalappuzha near Pathanamthitta district and wife C K Pankajakshi Amma have no legal claim to their own house. Their fault? None!

All Nair did was to mortgage his small plot of land for a loan of Rs 15,000 way back in 1975. He closed the loan a little after the term of 15 years but the cooperative lender’s assets had gone into administration ahead of an inevitable liquidation. He never got back the title deed he had surrendered as collateral.

A quarter of century after Nair fully repaid his debt, he is yet to be freed from liabilities. He is yet to get back the papers of his land. Neither does he know where to look for them. Nair and his wife have taken refuge in a relative’s house, like a landless old couple.

Nair borrowed Rs 15,000 from the Omallur Rural Cooperative Housing Society to build a house and repaid the entire amount with interest by November 19, 1992. In the meantime, the cooperative had been rocked by a corruption scandal that pushed it into administration.

The administrator told Nair that the title deed was with the Housing Federation and he would soon get it. However, the next thing Nair heard was the news about the society’s liquidation.

Nair pursued the matter with the cooperative societies assistant registrar in Kozhencherry, but to no avail. He never got back the title deed even though he was free from any debt obligation.

Bureaucracy does not budge

Nair approached the chief minister for relief in 2001. The chief minister handed over the application to the department concerned.

As a result, Nair received a letter from the assistant registrar in Pathanamthitta. The letter confirmed that Nair had repaid the bank in full and there was no legal objection to return the collateral.

Months later, the document still elusive. Nair went directly to the assistant registrar’s office to inquire. He was told that the Ommallur cooperative had borrowed from the Housing Federation to lend to Nair. Though Nair had repaid his debt, the society had not. The Housing Federation would not return the document unless it got its money.

The Housing Federation officials repeated the claim. They told Nair pointblank that he could not expect to get back the title deed unless the liquidated cooperative paid up. Nair has no clue who is responsible to pay back the federation or why was that not done. His only refuge is the receipt given by the cooperative at the time of the closing of the loan.

Left homeless

Nair's house was in ruin. The elderly couple had no other way but to tear it down and build another one. They expected that they could borrow some money for the work. The house was razed and work on a new one was started with whatever money the couple had saved.

The couple was in for a shock when they applied for a bank loan. No bank would extend them a loan without a collateral. Their only asset, their land, was without a document.

The octogenarian pensioner had knocked on all doors. The official liquidator of the society wrote back to Nair on January 17 that he had written to the Housing Federation for the title deed.

Nair, tired or waiting, is planning to approach the Kerala Human Rights Commission.

Nair and Pankajakshi Amma has to get back the title deed to their own land. Even if they raise the money somehow to finish their house, they will need the title deed for the panchayat to approve of the building.

Read more: Pathanamthitta news