Andhra takes back land allotted to Brahmani Infratech

The government decided to take back the land from the company for non-implementation of the project, an official statement said here Saturday.

A notice was issued to the company in April 2011 for non-implementation of the project. The firm, in which the Navabharat Group hold majority stake, came forward to surrender the land after the government refused to extend to 2021 the time limit to complete the project.

In 2006 that the then government of Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy allotted the land to the company at Ravirala village near the Rajiv Gandhi International Airport to develop the IT special economic zone (SEZ). The land was sold to the company at Rs.26 lakh per acre.

The opposition Telugu Desam Party had alleged that the government gifted away the land worth Rs.3,000 crore, and demanded the government take it back.

The company has come under the scanner of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probing the alleged illegal assets of Y.S. Jaganmohan Reddy, who is at present lodged in a jail here.

It is one of the companies suspected to have made investments in Jaganmohan Reddy's businesses in return for the favours they received from the government of his father and then chief minister Rajasekhara Reddy.

The government during last one year cancelled some land allotments made during Rajasekhara Reddy's tenure. These include 15,000 acres allotted for a steel plant proposed to be developed in Kadapa district by former Karnataka minister Gali Janardhana Reddy, who is currently in jail in illegal mining case.