The Hindu : Andhra Pradesh / Hyderabad News : Change at helm may delay second phase of ORR

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Sep 09, 2006

Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh - Hyderabad

Change at helm may delay second phase of ORR

Staff Reporter

Rumours abound that Piyush Kumar will be considered for the post of Collector Rumours abound that Project Director Piyush Kumar will be considered for the post of Collector. If so, it may have an adverse impact on issues like land acquisition and Cetnral clearances

Piyush Kumar

HYDERABAD: Will the Outer Ring Road project get a new Project Director in place of Piyush Kumar? Rumours are rife that Mr. Piyush Kumar is being considered for appointment as Collector. Many feel that such a move at this stage would further delay the ORR second phase.

Mr. Piyush Kumar has been closely monitoring the project for one-and-a-half years and was involved with alignment finalisation for the second phase, special growth corridor regulations and grounding of the 24-km first phase from Gachibowli to Shamshabad.

Land acquisition soon

Any disturbance at the Project Director level at this juncture may further delay the second phase of the project for which land acquisition would commence once the cabinet sub-committee finalised the compensation package, HUDA officials feel.

Mr. Piyush Kumar admitted he was due for Collectorship as he belonged to 1997 batch. HUDA Vice-Chairman Jayesh Ranjan felt that the project would benefit if the present Project Director continued for some more time. Some more technical and environmental clearances need to be secured from the Central Government for the second phase and it would be convenient if an official well-versed with the project dealt with it, he said.

Crucial aspects

Though the first phase, that has already been grounded, would not be affected with change of guard, it would affect the second phase with regard to three critical aspects -- land acquisition and compensation, technical and environmental clearances and finalisation of financial model.

Meanwhile the technical committee headed by Vice-Chairman met on Friday to review the annuity model for 35 km of ORR second phase and would forward its report to the high level committee headed by Chief Secretary. For the rest of 100 km, multi-financial model was being explored, Mr. Ranjan said.

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