Union Minister for Tourism and Culture G. Kishan Reddy on Sunday found fault with the Telangana government for leasing out Outer Ring Road (ORR) to a private party for just Rs 7,380 crore for a period of 30 years, saying this deprived the state of Rs 75,000 crore revenues.<\/p>\n
He said the state government owes an explanation to people as awarding of toll collection, operation and maintenance of the ORR to a private agency for 30 years on Toll, Operate and Transfer (TOT) basis would result in a huge loss of revenue to the state.<\/p>\n
He told a news conference that the state government selected IRB Infrastructure Developers Limited in the bid in a predetermined manner and in violation of guidelines of National Highway Authority of India (NHAI).<\/p>\n
Kishan Reddy explained that the private agency will collect toll for 30 years on ORR after paying only Rs 7,380 crore to the government.<\/p>\n
He pointed out that so far Eagle Infra was collecting Rs 415 crore as toll on ORR for Hyderabad Metropolitan Development Authority (HMDA) every year.<\/p>\n
“If this toll collection increases by 5 per cent per year, HMDA would have earned Rs 30,000 crore for 30 years. Experts and engineers say the 10 per cent increase would mean a revenue of Rs 75,000 crore during the same period. If we assume a 15 per cent increase, the revenue for the government would be over Rs 2.08 lakh crore,” he said.<\/p>\n
Stating that Hyderabad is the fastest growing city in the country, the Union Minister said the toll revenue on ORR would only go up.<\/p>\n
He wondered why the BRS government which had been opposing privatisation gave ORR on lease for 30 years. Taking a dig at Chief Minister KCR, he asked if this was the qualitative change he wanted to bring.<\/p>\n
“The government should tell people for whose benefit this decision was taken,” he said.<\/p>\n
He questioned the need for awarding the contract for 30 years when most of the roads are leased for a maximum period of 10 years.<\/p>\n
The Union Minister alleged that BRS took the decision as it has realised that it will lose power in Telangana.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Union Minister for Tourism and Culture G. Kishan Reddy on Sunday found fault with the Telangana government for leasing out Outer Ring Road (ORR) to a private party for just Rs 7,380 crore for a period of 30 years, saying this deprived the state of Rs 75,000 crore revenues. He said the state government owes […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":229125,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[1564,5065],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n