NCS group to tie up funds for Botanical Gardens soon

Hyderabad-based NCS Group will achieve financial closure for its Botanical Gardens project by March 2009. The Rs 200crore project is coming up in the forest reserve land at Kondapur here and is being executed in public-private partnership with the Andhra Pradesh Forest Development Corporation.

Speaking to Business Standard, group managing director N Nageswara Rao said in Phase I the garden would be developed in 18 sectors spread over 120 acre. It would have about 5,000 species of plants, including several varieties sourced from botanical gardens across the world.

Of the proposed cost, the promoters' contribution would be 40 per cent from internal accruals. The remaining would be raised as debt from commercial banks and other financial channels. “It will take about a year for completing the gardening work after financial closure,” he said.

NCS has appointed project management company Western Solutions to handle the project from concept to completion and has also hired international architects.

Rao said they were in the process of tying up with Singapore Botanical Gardens for exchange of plants. This would be the first private botanical garden to go for platinum rating.

Though the project was granted six years ago, it could not take off due to various reasons including delay in providing substitute land for the reserve forest area and lack of guidelines, Rao said. The land has been given on a 33-year lease.

The group plans to build a museum and a library to promote science education and tourism besides a college of gardening. This apart, the group would construct a multistoreyed complex to house a shopping arena and service apartments in independent blocks in about 15 per cent of the area for making the project financially viable. “NCS will submit a business plan for the project encompassing education, tourism, entertainment and commercial segments to the APFDC in a couple of months,” said APFDC director (eco-tourism) P Madhu Sudhan Rao.