UoH had swapped Kancha Gachibowli land with Gopanapally land in 2004, says papers
Hyderabad:The Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) appears to have adopted double standards in the controversy over whether 400 acres of land — which Chief Minister A. Revanth Reddy decided to auction — belonged to the state government or University of Hyderabad.
BRS working president K.T. Rama Rao on Monday extended solidarity with the agitating UoH students and cried foul over the Chief Minister’s decision denying the university of its land. However, documentary evidence available with Deccan Chronicle revealed that the previous BRS government in the past vehemently argued that the university had no right over 534 acres including the one alloted to IMG Bharata.
The previous BRS government even went to the extent of arguing in the Telangana High Court that UoH doesn’t require 1,700 acres at all. It proposed to take back at least 160 acres and develop six parcels out of it and allot to different educational institutions.
“Despite repeated requests of the UoH, the BRS government ignored the long pending demand of the university to alienate 1,785 acres,” a senior revenue official pointed out.
An expert committee appointed by the previous BRS government had also recommended taking back 159 acres from the university for giving it to other educational institutions.
“The extent of land (1,785 acres) being requested for alienation by the petitioner university is much more than its requirement,” the government said in an affidavit filed before the High Court in Writ Petition No 816 of 2021.
The affidavit also clearly stated that the land given to IMG Bharata and other entities was clearly demarcated and that there was no truth in the university’s claim that it was in possession of the said land.
Further, the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC), which was under Rama Rao when he was the minister for municipal administration and urban development, bulldozed its way to form a road taking 18.30 acres of land on which the UoH claimed ownership.
When the University registrar was called for discussions which remained inconclusive, the GHMC went ahead with road leveling activity. “The petitioner university was surprised to notice that road leveling activity was taken up by the GHMC for the formation of a road,” the university counsel brought to HC’s notice.
The UoH had been given an alternate land parcel of 397 acres way back in 2004 in exchange of land taken for IMG Bharata thus raising serious questions over the university’s latest claims on the land that the Congress-led state government has decided to auction now.
The Panchanama copies of February 3, 2004, clearly showed that the university had handed over 534 acres in Survey No 25 of Kancha Gachibowli to the state government and took possession of 397 acres in Survey No 35, 36 and 37 of Gopanapally. In both the documents, then university registrar Y. Narasimhulu was a signatory.
