Telangana Cabinet approves new assembly, secretariat buildings

 

Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrashekhar Rao’s Cabinet has buildings for new assembly and secretariat in Hyderabad on Tuesday. 

 

The Cabinet, at a meeting that lasted more than five hours on Tuesday, decided the new Secretariat will come up at the existing place, while the new Assembly building would be constructed at a new location in the city and will be based on the pattern and facilities of the Parliament, the chief minister, who popularly goes by the acronym KCR, said at a press briefing later in the evening. 

 

Andhra Pradesh, which till has control over the Andhra part of the secretariat, will hand over the building to Telangana on Wednesday, the chief minister said. 

 

The current secretariat is housed in about 25 acres across the Hussain Sagar Lake.

In another significant decision, the Telangana chief minister said his government would honour the promise of increasing retirement age of government employees to 61.

 

The government had previously asked the Ministry of Defence to allow construction of the new secretariat complex at the Bison Polo grounds—a sports facility that belongs to the Ministry of Defence—but did not get a favourable response. The chief minister said while the old Assembly building would be preserved, the new Assembly building to be built at Erram Manzil area.

 

The state has been under the Model Code of Conduct for about six months since December 2018—first for assembly and then for parliamentary elections.  No major decisions were taken during this time.