After getting 71.25 acres of Digha-Patna rail line land for construction of road in the state capital, the Bihar government would soon acquire possession of the ITDC run hotel "Patliputra Ashok", Deputy Chief Minister Sushil Kumar Modi said today.
After getting the possession of the land and the building, the state government would take a decision whether the hotel should be run by it (state government) or be run in a PPP (Public Private Partnership) mode, he said.
Modi, who is also Bihar's Finance Minister, said that 1.5 acres of land belonging to state's Revenue and Land Reforms Department located at the prime location was given to Centre's Tourism ministry on a lease with certain terms and conditions on May 26, 1973.
It was also incorporated as the condition that the state government would take back its land by giving three months to the lessee (Tourism Ministry), he said adding that the Central government is going to disinvestment in ITDC run hotels that included "Patliputra Ashok".
The agreement to hand over the hotel at a cost of Rs 13 crore was reached during a meeting held on June 19 (2018) between Tourism Ministry's Secretary Rashmi Verma and state's Tourism Department's Principal Secretary Ravi Parmar in Delhi, the Deputy CM said.
Earlier, the valuation of the hotel including its land was fixed at Rs 28.5 crore but when the state govenrment reminded the Union Tourism Ministry that the land belonged to it and was given to the Ministry on a lease it was scaled down, Modi said.
It may be noted that the Bihar cabinet had on June 26 gave its nod for getting the 71.25 acres of Digha-Patna rail line land transferred to Road Construction Department on payment of Rs 222.19 crore for construction of 4/6 lane road on it.
(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)