Blockchain Platforms for Asset Management in India: Hyperledger vs Ethereum, Implementation Costs, and Scalability Barriers

Abstract

India's asset management systems, especially land records, property registries and ownership documents, face major challenges such as fraud, ownership disputes, slow manual verification and fragmented documentation. These issues affect citizens, government departments, financial institutions and real-estate stakeholders. Blockchain technology provides an opportunity to improve asset management by creating tamper-resistant records, transparent transaction history and automated workflows through smart contracts. This paper studies the use of blockchain platforms for asset management in India with a comparative focus on Hyperledger Fabric and Ethereum. The study analyzes technical architecture, performance, privacy, cost, scalability and implementation barriers. It also considers Indian use cases such as Telangana land parcel initiatives, Karnataka Bhoomi-related digital land record modernization and national-level blockchain adoption efforts. The findings show that Hyperledger Fabric is more suitable for regulated government asset systems because it provides permissioned access, privacy channels, higher transaction throughput and lower operational cost. Ethereum is useful for public transparency and open applications, but its public-chain gas cost, lower throughput and regulatory challenges reduce suitability for high-volume government asset records. The paper concludes that a permissioned blockchain model with proper standards, legacy-system integration, legal recognition and rural digital infrastructure can support scalable blockchain-based asset management in India.