Hyderabad: Racing club, tech firms seek same piece of land

Hyderabad: The Telangana state government is caught between IT/ITES firms and the Hyderabad Race Club  (HRC) for allotment of land near Shamshabad airport.

While IT firms are seeking the 250 acre that was allotted to an IT SEZ earlier and was cancelled by the Congress government in 2013, the HRC is also pitching for the same land to shift from Malakpet, as sought by the TS government for building  minority residential schools in Malakpet.

With the land parcel in Shamshabad located close to the IT corridor and the international airport, several IT/ITES firms have sought land allotment in Shamshabad and have submitted applications to the IT department.

The HRC in Malakpet is spread over 130 acres. Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao has announced several times during the last two-and-half years that his government plans to shift the club from Malakpet and relocate it on the city’s outskirts and to utilise the Malakpet land, in the heart of the city, to set up residential schools for minorities.

Mr Rao had offered to allot the same area of land to the club on the city’s outskirts. The HRC, however, had sought more land arguing that the land it had bought in Malakpet a few decades ago was now worth hundreds of crores and it deserved more land on the city’s outskirts to compensate for this. It said that it required more land for future expansion.

Though the government had identified some land parcels in Moinabad, Rajendranagar and Shabad mandals, the HRC was not in favour of them.
Finally, HRC zeroed in on a 200-acre plot at Mamidipally near Shamshabad airport.

The land had been allotted to Brahmani Infratech Pvt Ltd by the YSR government in 2006 to develop an IT SEZ. However, the company failed to execute the project later. Following this, the Kiran Kumar Reddy government cancelled the allotment in 2013 and since then the land has been lying vacant. Deputy CM and revenue minister Mohd Mahmood Ali said the proposal to allot this land to HRC was under the government’s consideration.

“Proposals in this regard have been sent to the government. But a final decision is yet to be taken. The government is keen to shift HRC from Malakpet at the earliest to set up minority residential schools. We want to start these schools from the new academic year in June 2017”, he said.