Hyderabad: Cash flow in suburbs ahead of rural polls

Hyderabad: With the gram panchayat elections in the offing, huge amounts of money are flowing into the gram panchayats that fall under the Hyderabad Metropolitan Development Authority (HMDA) and those close to the temple town of Yadadri and the Bengaluru Highway.

After the formation of Telangana, building activity has picked up sharply in villages such as Shankerpally, Janwada, Kadtal and Shah-bad, which come under HMDA limits, and also in villages near the Hyderabad-Bengaluru Highway and in Yadadri district, after the state government developed the temple at Yadagiri-gutta. Landlords have become crorepatis, as their lands fetch hefty prices, and they are now eyeing the post of sarpanch, a stepping stone to politics.

Villagers of Balanagar, Rajapur, Addakula, Devarakadra and Kund-uru, adjacent to the Bengaluru highway, say that the contestants are prepared to spend '1 crore for their election to the sarpanch’s post.

Land in villages adjacent to the Bengaluru Highway, in the mandals of Yadagirigutta, Bhongir, etc. fetches Rs 1 crore an acre. So contestants say if they lose the election they will have lost just an acre.