Nizamabad: The Telangana government has decided to construct official residences for MLAs in all 119 Assembly constituency headquarters across the newly formed state.
Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao has directed the officials to prepare modalities for the same.
Presently, in the three-tier local body system, sarpanch at village level, mandal parishad president at mandal level and zilla parishad chairperson at the district level have offices of their own.
Their counterparts in urban areas also have official chambers in municipalities and municipal corporations. However, there is no facility of official residence for MLAs at their respective Assembly constituencies.
The government provides residential accommodation to the legislators at old and new MLA quarters in Hyderabad. Usually, the MLAs live in their own house or in rented houses.
If the legislator belongs to any other constituency headquarters, he should rent a building to run the offices. Due to this, the MLAs maintain residence cum offices in towns nearest to the constituency headquarters.
To overcome all these hurdles, the Telangana go-vernment has decided to construct a permanent official residence for MLAs. The official residence will be useful for the MLAs to hold reviews and other meetings.
In Assembly constituency headquarters or other major towns in the constituency will be chosen for the construction of building.
For instance, in the Nizamabad rural Assembly constituency, the official residence may come up in Dichpally mandal headquarters, which is the biggest centre in the entire constituency.
Giving details, agriculture minister Pocharam Srinivas Reddy said the MLAs will hoist the national flag on Independence Day, Republic Day on August 15 and January 26 respectively. The officials could meet the legislator at the official residences, he added.
Any party leader representing as MLA could utilise the official residence facility soon, he said.
It is believed that the decision of the state government will give official status for legislators after Independence.
