KTR critical of Centre’s apathy, seeks support for Hyderabad metro expansion, skyways

NEW DELHI: Telangana Minister for Municipal Administration KT Rama Rao (KTR) on Friday sought Centre’s support for expediting various pending projects in Hyderabad. He called on Defence Minister Rajnath Singh at the latter’s residence in New Delhi and submitted a detailed report about the proposed elevated corridors and skywalks that needed to be taken up by the Centre considering the rapid expansion of Hyderabad.

Speaking to the media after the meeting, KTR said that, on several occasions, the Union Government was requested to provide assistance for expeditiously executing various development projects in Telangana. Even after nine years of the formation of the State, the Centre had not given a penny for development and there was no hope of support from them in future. However, they had come to Delhi to seek the Centre's cooperation without failing in their effort, he said.

KTR said that Hyderabad was expanding on all fronts and claimed that around 44 percent of jobs in the country's IT sector were coming from Telangana alone. Telangana had become a global hub for vaccine manufacturing while Hyderabad had been expanding rapidly in pharmaceuticals, IT, biotech and aerospace sectors, he said, adding that Hyderabad was contributing a lot to nation-building. He said that, considering the prominence of Hyderabad, they had requested Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union ministers to extend Centre’s support for improving infrastructure in the Telangana capital city. “Worse still, the Centre didn’t even stand behind Hyderabad during the floods in 2020,” he lamented.

The municipal minister said: “It takes an excruciatingly long time for the public to reach the suburbs of Hyderabad from the surrounding districts. To prevent such problems, we have prepared detailed project reports (DPR) for constructing skyways to decongest the city from traffic. However, the cantonment lands are obstructing the construction of the proposed skyways.

“We requested the Defence Minister to give cantonment lands in Secunderabad for the construction of skyways proposed between Patny and Kandlakoya via Suchitra Junction and the other, from the Gymkhana Cricket Stadium or Jubilee Bus Stand (JBS) in Secunderabad towards the Outer Ring Road till Turkapally,” KTR said.

The Telangana minister said that around 96 acres of land were required for the construction of the skyway to Rajiv Rahadari (the State Highway) from JBS and 56 acres of land for the skyway upto Turkapally. Even though the State Government was ready to provide land-to-land for expediting the proposed skyway projects, there was no response from the Centre. Similar is the case with the expansion of MMTS, he criticised. ‘’We are also constructing skywalks on par with skyways. The sky walk undertaken in Uppal was completed and will be inaugurated on Monday. But, the project commenced in Mehdipatnam was stalled due to Defence Department constraints,’’ he said.

The municipal minister said that 142 link roads had been planned in Hyderabad. He said that the work was progressing at a slow pace as the link roads near the Cantonment area were obstructing the project. Observing that the Centre should respond positively in this regard, he asked Rajnath Singh to transfer the leased lands under the cantonment to Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) for construction of community halls, houses and basthi dawakhanas.

A representation will also be submitted to Union Home Minister Amit Shah seeking his support for the completion of the link road project near Rasoolpura junction and for the 35 underpasses and 35 flyovers under the SRDP project, as Union Tourism Minister G Kishan Reddy failed to address the problem, KTR commented.

Referring to the expansion of the Metro Rail in Hyderabad, KTR said that a Detailed Project Report (DPR) was prepared and submitted to the Centre for the expansion of Metro lines between BHELand Lakdikapool (via Serilingampally and Miyapur) for a length of 31 km and Nagole-LB Nagar for five km under phase-II Metro expansion project in October. So far, there was no response from the Centre in this regard, he said. KTR also said that the Metro Rail expansion issue would be taken to the notice of the Minister of Housing and Urban Affairs on Saturday.

KTR also lashed out at the Centre for completely ignoring construction of the Metro line between Patancheru and Hayathnagar. “The Union Government, which had sanctioned Metro Rails to about 10 small towns in Uttar Pradesh, should explain why it does not want to cooperate with Metro in Hyderabad,” he questioned.

“Kishan Reddy must explain to the people of Telangana as to why the Centre did not cooperate when there were floods in Hyderabad when it could grant relief to Gujarat and other BJP states,” he demanded. KTR also said that revenue generated from Telangana was being utilised in poor states ruled by the BJP. “BJP leaders should thank the people and Government of Telangana for contributing immensely to nation-building,” the minister said.