Telangana administration appears to be entering space age. The state will soon allow the district officials to use helicopters to reach out to the people in emergencies. The state government is equipping the district administration to press helicopters into service when needed. This is in tune with the state policy to adapt state-of-the-art technologies in the governance.

All the district collectorates will soon have rooftop helipads. This provision is going to be the important component of the proposed collectorates in the state. Chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao is planning to construct ultramodern integrated collectorates with space for about 30 departments for the proposed new districts in the state.

KCR government is going to bifurcate almost all districts to create new districts by August 15 or Dasara. The CM himself revealed that another 14 or 15 districts would be added to the existing ten districts.

All the major towns such as Siddpet, Sanga Reddy, Vikaarabad, Jaherabad, Gadwal, Nagarkurnool, Miryalaguda etc will be upgraded into new districts. Even though there have been demands from the public as well as political parties for new districts from more than two towns in every district , chief minister is said to have limited this to 14 or 15 , in addition to the existing ten.

He instructed the officials to educate the people about the criteria being followed to carved out new districts. He asked them to convince people that it is not political compulsion but administrative convenience that forms the basis for new districts. While reviewing the designs submitted for the proposed collectorate, the CM asked them to incorporate provision for helipad in all collectorates.

“Helicopter is not a luxury these days. Now it has become a mode of transport. Not to waste time on road and to avoid traffic snarls, officials can use helicopters during emergencies,” the CM told the officials. He said in future Telangana officials invariably would have to use helicopters for public convenience.
Already Telangana has started helicopter services in the state. The services were first launched during Sammakka Sarakka jatara. Now the government is planning to start helicopter services between Hyderabad and Srisailam during Krishna Puskaralu .

Now the chief minister is the only government functionary who is using the helicopter in the state. Once the helicopters made available to district administrations, copters start crisscrossing the state airspace. Because given the massive projects and the related review meetings at CMO, officers would be asked to attend the meeting at a short notice. And every occasion is an emergency in its own right.

While his Andhra counterpart Chandrababu Naidu is planning an airport in every district, KCR wants to make do with helicopters for the time being.