Kancha Gachibowli, a 400 acre land parcel has found itself once again at the heart of a controversy in Telangana’s capital Hyderabad. The controversy erupted when University of Hyderabad (UoH)’s student union protested against the Congress-led state government’s decision to call for bids to auction the 400 acres for IT and infrastructure projects. Students accused the state government of taking over one of the few ‘lung spaces’ and ecologically important parts of the city.
The situation turned tense when on Sunday, March 30, several students were detained and taken to area police stations under the Cyberabad Commissionerate. Two of the protesters were arrested by the Gachibowli police following an FIR and have been remanded to the Sangareddy jail. The state opposition Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) has thrown its weight behind the student protests and criticised the ‘police action’. With the students and BRS already slamming the Congress, UoH issued a statement disavowing Congress’ claims that Kancha Gachibowli’s 400 acres have been demarcated from the university.
Chief Minister Revanth Reddy and the Congress party have said that the 400 acres is very much government land and not ‘one acre of University land’ has been touched. The government is of the view that the land is not notified as forest land and is in fact revenue land. The ‘Kancha’ in Kancha Gachibowli refers to ‘unproductive land’, which the state argues is revenue land as per the earliest records.
Kancha Gachibowli falls under the western part of Hyderabad, an area well known owing to the presence of the city’s financial district, a concrete jungle with little green space left. Scientists and environmental experts TNM spoke to said it was incumbent on the state to prove that Kancha Gachibowli was not ecologically rich to justify auctioning the land.
Currently, there are two Public Interest Litigations against the state government in the Telangana High Court. The first PIL was filed by the NGO Vata Foundation, requesting the High Court to declare transfer of land to the Telangana State Industrial Infrastructure Corporation (TGIIC) as ‘arbitrary and illegal’. The second PIL filed by retired Indian Institute of Chemical Technology (IICT) scientist Babu Rao Kalpala sought the court to declare the state’s action of razing 400 acres of forest land issued by the Revenue Department as unlawful and a violation of the Forest Conservation Act, 1980.
The major questions are about the demarcation between Kancha Gachibowli and UoH, specific plans the state has for the 400 acres, and more importantly, how the state plans to protect Kancha Gachibowli’s biodiversity as the area is considered as one of the few ‘lung spaces’ left in the city.
From TDP till date: Legal tussle involving Kancha Gachibowli
TNM looked at the court verdicts involving Kancha Gachibowli and traced the row to 2003 under former united Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu’s tenure. The land first gained notoriety after the state government, under the Telugu Desam Party (TDP), entered into an agreement with IMG Bharata, represented by its chairman Ahobila Rao (known popularly as Billy Rao).
According to the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), the state government identified IMG Bharata as an entity “renowned in the field of events, entertainment and marketing” and agreed to sell 400 acres of land in Survey No 25 of Gachibowli to build, develop, own, and operate sports academies. IMG Bharata was falsely portrayed before the public as a subsidiary of IMG Academy, a sports training destination in Florida, USA.
The state government also agreed to sell another 450 acres (850 acres in total) to IMG Bharata in Survey No 99/1 of Mamidapalli village to enable IMG to build, operate and for extension of facilities and activities relating to sports academies.
IMG Bharata was incorporated on August 5, 2003 and the MoU with the TDP was signed five days later on August 9. Following the change in government in 2004, the Congress (headed by late Chief Minister YS Rajasekhara Reddy) enacted the Andhra Pradesh Government Property (Preservation, Protection and Resumption) Act of 2007.
Under the 2007 Act, the MoU and sale deed with IMG Bharata was annulled. Billy Rao approached the court arguing that the Act was unconstitutional. The case was wrapped up in litigation for around 18 years and did not come up for hearing. After the bifurcation of the Telugu states in 2014, the Telangana government adapted the 2007 Act under by issuing a government order (GO Ms No 45) under the Telangana Adaptation of Laws Order, 2016.
Billy Rao had argued that the 2007 Act suffered from arbitrariness and violated Article 14 (Right to Equality).
The Telangana High Court noted three things: One, that IMG Bharata was not a subsidiary of a US company as claimed and was given a contract five days after it was incorporated. Two, that the 2007 Act annulled the transaction to “protect and preserve public interest”. Third, it said that Billy Rao’s contention that a sale deed cannot be annulled by taking recourse to legislative powers cannot be accepted.
The writ petition was dismissed. The Special Leave Petition moved by Billy Rao in the Supreme Court was also dismissed.
Consequently, the 400 acres was handed over to the TGIIC.
What the Congress government has argued
The state government has argued that the land parcel does not include Buffalo lake and Peacock lake (popular spots on the UoH campus). The state said that TGIIC has prepared a layout duly preserving the rock formations, including Mushroom Rock, as part of the master plan, and is also preparing a detailed Environment Management Plan (EMP) that will ensure sustainable development of the region.
The government noted that revenue authorities and TGIIC had ensured that revenue officials in the presence of UoH authorities carried out a survey to ensure that not one inch of university land was touched.
The current project (in the 400 acres) is in line with the government’s priorities of providing world-class IT infrastructure, improved connectivity, and availability of adequate urban spaces, the CMO also said on March 31.
UoH’s response
The University rejected the state’s claims of a survey being conducted in July 2024. UoH Registrar Devesh Nigam in a press statement said that “no survey was conducted in July 2024 by the revenue authorities in the University campus to demarcate the 400 acres of land resumed by the state government in 2006 from Ms IMG Academies Bharata Pvt Ltd.”
“The only action taken thus far has been a preliminary inspection of the land’s topography,” the Registrar said.
He also refuted TGIIC’s claim that UoH had agreed to the demarcation of campus land, saying it was not informed of any such move.
The Registrar said they had requested the state government to clearly demarcate the land belonging to the university and also conserve the biodiversity in the disputed area.
UoH has, for the last several years, found itself entangled in litigation pertaining to its land rights. UoH claims that in 1975 the united Andhra Pradesh government allotted 2,324 acres to them but the Telangana High Court in 2022 noted that no official documentation exists to confirm this transfer.
Opposition response
BRS working president KT Rama Rao (KTR) has condemned the police action against the students.
“Female students were dragged, their clothes torn, and two students were arrested and sent to jail,” he said. He also asked why the government was deploying “hundreds of bulldozers and excavators” to clear trees instead of complying with the students’ demand for an environmental impact assessment study.
Union Minister of State for Home Affairs and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Bandi Sanjay Kumar termed the police action on protesters “atrocious and inhumane”. He alleged that university land was being stealthily levelled using JCBs at night instead of securing the land for future generations.
But despite these criticisms, the state has remained firm on its stance. In the state Assembly, CM Revanth even said, “There are no deer, no tigers, but only ‘cunning jackals’ who want to hinder the state’s development.”