KAMAREDDY: The fuel for the Kamareddy’s conflagration on Thursday was the fear of farmers over their lands losing value if the industrial zone of the proposed master plan comes up near their fields.
The farmers’ anxiety played out in the form of a violent agitation on Thursday. As it took an ugly turn with farmers storming the Collector’s office, it became a state-wide issue, necessitating even Industries Minister K T Rama Rao to pull up officials for not taking the farmers into confidence before deciding on where the industrial zone of the master plan should be located.
When the officials decided that January 11 would be the last date for filing objections against the master plan, the farmers barged into the collector’s office smelling a “conspiracy” in the name of development while leaving the real estate businessmen whose lands are in other areas.
The master plan is revised every 20 years. As a part of this exercise, the civic body appointed an agency to come up with a new master plan for the town for the next 20 years -- 2041.
In this backdrop, a draft master plan was approved by the council, and it was up for public scrutiny on November 13. The civic body set January 11 as the deadline for receiving objections. The draft master plan was published in all leading newspapers, and its copies were made available at all government offices, and gram panchayat offices.
After considering the objections received from the public, the Council proposed to discuss them and send them to the Municipal Administration Department. The municipal administration in turn would send it to the state government for clearance which may take six months.
According to government regulations, the master plan of any town should allocate 7 to 8 per cent of the land as an industrial zone. As a part of this requirement, the land near the National Highway has been proposed as an industrial zone.
The farmers are free to continue agriculture operations in lands near the industrial zone and they would get all government incentives. But they cannot convert their land for residential purposes. If you want to, you can apply to the civic body which after discussing it in the council would send it to the government for clearance.
Around 1,200 acres of land in five villages have been shown as the industrial zone. A farmer expressed his fear that his land close to the industrial zone would lose its value once the zone comes up. There is a huge difference in the value of the land near the industrial zone and those close to other zones.
The farmers suspect that the civic body is eyeing their land for locating the industrial zone while not looking at areas where real estate developers are launching projects both commercial and residential.
Kamareddy is a business centre, 120 km away from Hyderabad and is located next to National Highway No. 44. The town is on the railway map. It shares a border with Medak, Nizamabad and Sircilla districts.
According to Kamareddy Municipality Town Planning Officer Lingala Giridhar Rao, the master plan was prepared in 2000 and has been in force ever since.
KCR’s folks from K’reddy
Chief Minister KCR’s parents migrated to Siddipet from Kamareddy. Minister K T Rama Rao has taken up several devpt programmes in his grandmother’s village.
