BRS eyeing 'costly' 11 acres at Kokapet for party office; Telangana HC sends notice

Hyderabad: On Tuesday, the High Court Division Bench comprising Acting Chief Justice Abhinand Kumar Shavili and Justice N Rajeshwar Rao ordered the state government to respond to a petition challenging the allotment of 11 acres to the BRS, for the construction of a party office, at a throwaway price of Rs 3,41,25,000 (more than Rs 3 crore) when the market value of the land in Kokapet is Rs 50 crores.

The bench sent notices to the chief secretary, commissioner HMDA, chief commissioner of Land Administration, collector RR District and the general secretary BRS party ordering them to respond by August 16, 2023. The public interest litigation (PIL) was filed by the NGO, Forum for Good Governance.

Satyam Reddy, senior counsel appearing for the petitioner, Forum for Good Governance, informed the court that even the tender process was not followed while allotting prime real estate worth crores of rupees to the BRS party at a throwaway price. Further, the counsel said that the proceedings regarding the land allotment were not posted in the public domain and asked the court to order a copy of the proceedings from the BRS government.

J Ramchander Rao, addl. advocate general informed the court that the Cabinet is yet to take a call on the allotment of the land. Once the decision is taken, a copy of the proceedings will be made available in the public domain, he said.

Acting Chief Justice Abhinand Kumar Shavili, after hearing the contentions of the addl. advocate general said that if the Cabinet has not taken a decision on fixing the price of the 11 acres of land, then the litigation is premature and directed the BRS government to file its response within four weeks.

The Division Bench was adjudicating the PIL filed by Forum for Good Governance, represented by its secretary M Padmanabha Reddy challenging the decision of the BRS government for allotting 11 acres of prime government land in survey numbers 239 and 240 of Kokapet village, Gandipet mandal, RR district in favour of the Bharat Rashtra Samithi party for constructing its party office.

The PIL mentioned that the BRS general secretary, who made an application for allotment of the 11 acres of land, stated that the land would be used for establishing an Institute for Excellence and Human Resource Development.

The case was adjourned to August 16.