Days after the anti-corruption bureau received the Governor’s nod to prosecute him, BRS working president K T Rama Rao on Friday accused the Telangana government of formulating a new policy to convert industrial land into real estate, dubbing it a land scam to benefit Chief Minister Revanth Reddy.
However, Industry Minister D Sridhar Babu denied the allegation. He said the government’s decision to levy an impact fee for the conversion of industrial land, which Rao suggested was a scam, was nothing but “malicious propaganda.”
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Dubbing Hyderabad Industrial Lands Transformation Policy (HILTP) as the “biggest land scam in the history of India”, Rao alleged that the policy was designed solely to benefit a network of politically connected middlemen, relatives and real estate groups close to the chief minister.
He said the government was presenting the policy as an initiative to regularise land, but in reality, it was a deliberate move to convert thousands of acres of high-value industrial land into multi-use real estate at a much-discounted price.
“This is not just a policy; it is a blueprint for a Rs 5 lakh crore scam. Under the guise of industrial land regularisation, Revanth Reddy has initiated the largest scam India has ever witnessed.”
He alleged that the policy seeks to regularise nearly 9,292 acres of prime industrial clusters in key areas, including Balanagar, Jeedimetla, Sanathnagar and Azamabad.
He claimed that given the current open market value of these lands, estimated at Rs 40 to Rs 50 lakh crore per acre, the total market value of these plots stands between Rs 4 lakh crore and Rs 5 lakh crore.
He said, “Revanth (Reddy) is attempting to hand over these lands for just 30 per cent of the government’s outdated rate fixed by the sub-registrar’s office (SRO), which was 4-5 times lower than the market price.”
However, he pointed out that public land cannot be given away for private benefit at a cheaper price. Accusing the government of moving at lightning speed, the former industry minister warned real estate developers that such projects would fail to stand up to legal scrutiny.
Industry minister Sridhar Babu said the HILTP policy was only for lands in industrial estates and industrial plots within ORR where land is already freehold. This does not apply to Azamabad, Balanagar and Hafeezpet.
The government has only allowed those who already hold valid ownership rights over land to apply for land use conversion and only after multiple meetings with the industrialists. The government expects Rs 4,000 crore -Rs 5,000 crore under conversion impact charges, said the minister.
