Hyderabad: The AP government is likely to leave a fortune worth crores of rupees in the form of furniture when it shifts the Secretariat to the AP state capital region.
Furniture used in AP Secretariat in Hyderabad alone is worth an estimated Rs 25 crore, while the cost of chairs, tables, lockers etc. in other offices of the AP government is yet to be calculated.
According to AP government officials, this furniture may be auctioned off when Hyderabad ceases to be the joint capital at the end of 10 years. This would be a wiser move since transportation charges would be more than the cost of the furniture itself, the officials said.
After the TD government came to power in June 2014, it has spent lakhs of rupees on furniture. The CM, ministers and some IAS officers have renovated their offices in the Secretariat and purchased new furniture.
The state government also purchased some furniture for the CM’s camp office in the Lake View Guesthouse.
The 7th and 8th floors of L Block in the Secretariat, housing the Chief Secretary’s and the CM’s offices respectively, had been renovated spending crores of rupees. Lakhs were spent on the lavish dining hall in CM’s office alone.
Deputy Chief Minister K.E. Krishna Murthy, Yanamala Ramakrishnudu and some other ministers too had renovated their offices in the Secretariat and purchased new furniture, but had used these offices for hardly a year, before they shifted to Vijayawada from Hyderabad.
Mr Naidu and his Cabinet colleagues now use these offices only when they are in Hyderabad, and these visits are becoming fewer and further between.
The officials said that the money from the auction, and the money saved by not transporting the furniture would be enough to purchase new furniture for the offices to be shifted to AP capital region.
They said that after renovation of the CM’s camp office in Vijayawada, the thought of shifting the furniture from the CM’s office in the Secretariat was put on hold after they calculated the transportation charges.
The economics of transporting the furniture vis-a-vis buying new one were in favour of “out with the old, in with the new”, the officials felt.
