Navy to set up key station near city

Nearly 1400 acres of forest land will be allotted to the Indian Navy at Pudur mandal in Ranga Reddy district which is about 65 kms from the city.

The state government has agreed to allot the required land to Indian Navy to set up Very Low Frequency (VLF) station and Communications Station at Pudur. The Navy will monitor the Arabian sea, Bay of Bengal and Indian Ocean signals from this station, which according to them is a strategic location for the purpose.

Indian Navy Commadore (signals) Capt Alok Khanojo, T V Rao, joint director of Designing Chief Engineer Office, Indian Navy, Visakhapatnam and Ranga Reddy district joint collector M Jagan Mohan and sub-collector Mutyala Raju conducted joint inspection at Pudur on Friday.

“A survey will be conducted for demarcation of the required land for Indian Navy by January 20. The state government has agreed to give the land which is a reserve forest land,” Jagan Mohan told TOI on Friday.

Officials said there are about 2700 acres of forest land in Pudur. Since the Navy wanted an entire 1400 acres at a stretch in that area, the state government gave a green signal for the allotment.

While the revenue department will allot the same extent of the land to the forest department, the Indian Navy will bear the expenditure to grow trees in the allotted land.

Prior to that, the Navy had sought 1,000 acres of land at Vikarabad mandal in RR district which is about 70 km from the city. The defence wing also expressed its readiness to pay compensation to private land owners if there was government land around the area, but the revenue department informed them that there was no government land and it would be impossible to acquire private land in such a huge extent. Following this, the Navy reportedly chose the forest land at Pudur.