The Telangana Secretariat in Hyderabad that was completely vacated this weekend, cannot be demolished immediately. At least not till 14 October. The Telangana High court stayed the decision of the demolition of the State Secretariat by the Telangana government. 

The petitioners who are opposing the move, arguing it is a waste of public money, apprehended that the government may go ahead with the demolition during the court’s Dasara vacation. Many of the blocks at the Secretariat complex are a little over a decade old, occupied when YS Rajasekhara Reddy was CM of united Andhra Pradesh (pic below).

While the government pointed out that all departments had been moved out of the Secretariat, the court made the point that any attempt to demolish the Secretariat building would amount to “scuttling the judicial process, reducing the petitions to an academic exercise”. Petitions against the government’s move have been pending since 2016, when the move was first mooted.

In June, the TRS government had decided to build a new complex and subsequently even performed the ground-breaking ceremony for the same. 

The court has already ordered that heritage palace Errum Manzil in Hyderabad cannot be brought down to build a new Assembly building.