N.V.S. Reddy’s Comments on Hyderabad Metro Rail Spark Backlash

Hyderabad: HMRL managing director N.V.S. Reddy portraying the city Metro Rail in poor light hasn’t go down well with the top brass of state administration. The government, according to sources, has actively been considering a replacement for N.V.S. Reddy, at the helm of affairs for over 15 years.

At a programme on Monday, Reddy had said the L&T, the Hyderabad Metro Rail concessionaire, had been suffering from huge losses of Rs 1,300 crore per annum, which had accumulated to Rs 6,000 crore in the last few years. He said banks were shying away from giving loans for the expansion of the Metro Rail project.

The MD’s observations came at a time when the Revanth Reddy state government was all set to launch the second and third phases of Metro Rail with an outlay of nearly Rs 25,000 crore.

“This is shocking and completely unwarranted. We recently accorded administrative sanction for the project and have been trying hard to approach international funding agencies,” said a senior state official. “As head of institution, N.V.S. Reddy cannot talk ill of the project and portray it as loss-making,” the official added.

There were reports earlier that L&T was trying to exit from the project due to losses, part of which occurred due to delays post state bifurcation. Then Chief Minister K. Chandrashekar Rao had stalled the project by insisted on certain changes in the alignment but finally okayed the previous one.

“L&T failed to monetise the huge asset base given to it as part of the project,” pointed out an official from the municipal administration and urban development department, explaining reasons for the company incurring losses. Since the company has no experience in real estate, it couldn’t make best use of the land bank, he added.