Rent Agreement Stamp Duty in Madhya Pradesh

For a typical residential agreement up to 11 months, Madhya Pradesh charges ₹500 flat. Three independent sources agree: agreements up to 11 months pay a flat ₹500, generated as an e-stamp on the SAMPADA portal, with no registration needed.

Under Section 17 of the Registration Act, a lease of immovable property for 12 months or longer MUST be registered with the sub-registrar — which costs time, registration fees, and higher stamp duty. An 11-month agreement stays below that threshold, so it can be executed on stamp paper without mandatory registration. That's the whole reason 11 months became India's default tenancy term.

Mandatory over 11-12 months; explicitly not required for 11-month agreements (voluntary e-registration from home is available).

Best-in-class — SAMPADA 2.0 (launched Oct 2024) made MP the first state with fully paperless e-stamp + e-registration of rent agreements from home with video KYC and ~24-hour turnaround.

An unstamped or under-stamped agreement is not admissible as evidence in court until the deficit duty plus a penalty (up to 10× the deficit in most states) is paid. Police verification, HRA claims, address proof, and eviction proceedings can all stumble on an unstamped agreement — the duty is small, so pay it upfront.

The law doesn't fix this; it's whatever the agreement says. In practice the tenant usually bears the stamp duty and registration costs in most Indian cities, though splitting 50:50 is common in some markets. Put the split in writing in the agreement itself.