Revanth fumes after being denied entry into Secretariat

HYDERABAD: Alleging that the state government had assigned tender to a Mumbai-based company to collect toll fees from customers on Outer Ring Road (ORR) for a throwaway price of ₹246 crores (the existing tender fetches ₹750 crores annually), TPCC chief A. Revanth Reddy said here on Monday that they would conduct an inquiry into all tenders called for by the BRS government after the Congress comes to power in Telangana state.

Incidentally, when he went to Secretariat to meet the municipal administration principal secretary Aravind Kumar to file an RTI application, police intercepted him and asked him to take an appointment. Later, Reddy went to Masab Tank where he met municipal administration officers and filed a RTI query seeking information on ORR toll fee collection.

"I was stopped by the police and asked to take permission to meet higher officials. I am an MP and I have no need to take any such permission. The Chief Minister, who espouses the ideology of Dr B.R. Ambedkar has failed to implement it by denying MP entry into the state Secretariat,” Reddy said.
He said that when Congress was in power, they had constructed ORR in Hyderabad by spending around ₹6,696 crores. The government introduced toll plazas to collect fees.

"Every year, the state government gets ₹750 crore through them. But, the BRS ruling government assigned the process of collection of toll fees to a private company by giving it at a lowly price of ₹246 crores per year depriving the exchequer of precious revenue," Reddy alleged.