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Davos 2019: Blockchain Could Transform Land Titling In India, Says Sheila Warren

Blockchain could potentially transform land titling and registries in India, according to Sheila Warren.



A farmer works in a millet field while a cow stands tethered on the outskirts of Bengaluru, India. (Photographer: Dhiraj Singh/Bloomberg)
A farmer works in a millet field while a cow stands tethered on the outskirts of Bengaluru, India. (Photographer: Dhiraj Singh/Bloomberg)

Blockchain could potentially transform land titling and registries in India, according to Sheila Warren.

The head of blockchain and distributed ledger technology at the World Economic Forum said governments, including India’s, are evincing interest in the technology.

India, she said, is also examining payments interfaces and the movement of government services onto a blockchain-backed system that could provide efficiency, accountability and transparency to citizens.

“A lot of this is being explored at the federal level right now and there is a lot of exploration around the government processes, and they’re helping the Indian government with policy creation,” she told BloombergQuint in an interaction.

A lot of states in the south are looking at this technology in terms of land titling, but it’s not active yet, but it’s going to be there in short order, and we are very bullish on it.
Sheila Warren, head of Blockchain & Distributed Ledger Technology, World Economic Forum     

“If you have a blockchain-based record system, it has the immutability aspect of watching technology, which means you essentially have a permanent record of ownership,” she said, adding that a permanent record of ownership would provide emotional security and comfort to families and businesses.

She, however, wasn’t sure whether the technology would help fight corruption. “It’s not at all obvious... If anything, one could argue that the default would be the enhanced ability to exploit the information by nefarious acts.”