Advisor to Government Shabbir Ali felt that the BRS was in an impoverished state and it did not deserve the allotment of land in Kokapet.
Mohammad Shabbir Ali. (Facebook)
In what appears to be Congress’s style of getting even with the BRS, the grand old party has urged the state government to revoke the allotment of 11 acres of very expensive land in Kokapet in the Gandipet village on Hyderabad’s outskirts, allotted to the pink party when it was in power.
The party leader and Advisor to Government Mohammad Shabbir Ali, speaking to reporters at Gandhi Bhavan in Hyderabad on Monday, 24 June, felt that the BRS was in an impoverished state and therefore did not deserve the allotment of 11 acres of land in Kokapet.
He said the BRS should be satisfied with the party office it has in Banjara Hills.
When the K Chandrashekar Rao (KCR)-led Cabinet decided on the allotment of the land to the BRS, it was reportedly kept under the wraps, lest there should be controversy over expensive land being allotted by the government to the BRS.
According to sources, Shabbir Ali would not have made the plea without the consent of the chief minister himself.
The Congress leaders were reportedly very angry over the BRS slamming the grand old party earlier in the day for orchestrating the defection of MLAs.
They believe that, of all the parties, the BRS had no moral right to talk about defections.
They argue that during its 10-year rule, it had spirited away 59 elected representatives of all parties including the Congress, altering the political landscape of Telangana.
The Congress leader suddenly brought up the issue of revoking the allotment of the 11-acre land to the BRS when it was in power, apparently to hit back at the BRS and hand out a warning that no one would be left in the party in a few days.
Shabbir Ali said that about 30 BRS MLAs were ready to switch sides.
He said that the land was worth ₹1,100 crore and that the BRS did not deserve that much land which is so expensive.
The party feels the land could be resumed from the BRS and sold to fund waiving crop loan waiver and Rythu Bharosa.
Shabbir Ali pointed out that the BRS had lost deposits in eight of the 17 Lok Sabha seats and got only 16.88 percent of the votes.
There was an erosion of its vote bank from the Assembly elections when it got 37.3 percent of the total votes polled, he said.
The party sources said that the KCR-led government had allotted the land to the BRS at ₹37 crore per acre. The party wants lands allotted to the BRS in all districts to be resumed as its strength is coming down fast.
In August last year, the high court dismissed petitions challenging the allotment of the land to the BRS on technical grounds, which came as a shot in the arm from the pink party.
The court dismissed a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) that had sought cancellation of the allotment of 11 acres to the BRS and 10 acres to Congress in Kokapet and Bowenpally respectively and directed the state government to use the land for the construction of double-bedroom houses.
The court felt that it was beyond its powers to give such an order and asked them to make a representation to the state government to use the land for the construction of double-bedroom houses for the weaker sections.
(Edited by Muhammed Fazil)
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