Centre Pressed to Approve Funds for Hyderabad Metro Phase-II Expansion

Fast Summary

• Bhongir MP Chamala Kiran Kumar Reddy raised the issue of Hyderabad metro Rail Phase-II in Lok Sabha under Rule 377, highlighting a lack of sanction for the project.
• He criticized the neglect shown to Hyderabad’s metro expansion despite smaller cities such as Agra, Bhopal, bhubaneswar, Indore, Kanpur, Kochi, Lucknow, meerut, Nagpur, Patna, Pune, Surat, and Trivandrum receiving approvals for their metro rail projects.
• Reddy noted that Hyderabad Metro was the second-largest network in India (after New Delhi) in 2010 but has now slipped to ninth place.He attributed this decline to negligence by previous state governments.
• The first phase of Hyderabad Metro Rail spanned three corridors over 69 km and cost ₹22,000 crore during its construction under the congress government.
• The Telangana government submitted a proposal for Phase-II expansion covering five corridors (76.4 km) at an estimated cost of ₹24,269 crore on a Joint Venture (JV) basis wiht the Government of India.

Indian Opinion Analysis
the demand for sanctioning Hyderabad Metro Rail Phase-II highlights disparities in metro rail project approvals across Indian cities despite clear evidence of urban growth and increasing traffic congestion in major hubs like hyderabad. While comparisons to smaller cities may help build urgency around this project’s necessity from an equity perspective-given metro systems’ proven influence on regional economic integration-the slow pace reinforces concerns about bureaucratic inefficiencies or political priorities shaping infrastructure development unfairly between regions.

The fiscal size and scope indicate careful planning by telangana’s state administration; however high demands on resources at both central and state levels might complicate approvals especially given squeezed public finances elsewhere nationally competitive simultaneous demand

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