Hyderabad Disaster Response and Asset Protection Agency (HYDRAA), 2024 : A Sustainable Urban Governance Model

Policy Update
Ravirala Lahari

Background 

Historically, Hyderabad was known as “City of lakes”, it was built with a cascade of interconnected lakes (Golusu Katuu), and storm-water drains (nalas) around the Musi river to store and redistribute monsoon runoff across the Deccan plateau. Following the Musi river floods of 1908, prompted engineer M. Visvesvaraya designed an integrated flood-defense system featuring Osman Sagar and Himayat Sagar reservoirs, supported by thousands of catchment tanks (swarajya, 2016).
That system held for over a century but decades of unregulated urban growth led to built-up area rose to 136% increase in the land area covered by physical footprint of the constructions and urban development between 1973-1996 alone. Satellite data from the National Remote Sensing Centre (NRSC) indicates that over 61% of Hyderabad’s water bodies have vanished or been severely degraded between 1979 and 2023 (samal et al., 2025). This resulted in severe urban crises including urban heat, recurrent flash floods notably the severe October 2020 floods and subsequent urban inundations.

Authority over Hyderabad’s water was never absent but it was distributed across rigid, non-communicating silos. The Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) for municipal limits, the Hyderabad Metropolitan Development Authority (HMDA) for metropolitan planning, the Irrigation Department under the Telangana Water, Land and Trees Act (WALTA), 2002, and the Real Estate Regulatory Authority (RERA) for project approvals. Each body held partial, procedurally correct authority; none held end-to-end accountability. A builder could secure a RERA registration and a GHMC building permit for a project that Irrigation Department survey records would show sitting inside a lake’s Full Tank Level (FTL) or buffer zone, with no single office positioned to catch the contradiction before construction began. These structures produce Irrational outcomes when no actor holds the whole picture. As there is no shared data infrastructure, no single accountable authority, and no cross departmental clearance checkpoints the existing institutions failed to co-ordinate. Not because of negligence by one body, but because of how the system itself was designed.

Against this backdrop, the government of Telangana constituted the Hyderabad Disaster Response and Asset Protection agency on 19 July 2024 (G.O. Ms No. 99) later reinforced by an amendment to the GHMC Act 1955, granting it sweeping powers to protect public assets like lakes, drains, roads, parks, and open spaces spread across the Telangana Core Urban Region (TCUR) HYDRAA was formed to streamline fragmented responsibilities, it offers a live test of whether a single-mission, IPS-led enforcement agency can succeed where a web of specialised departments could not.

Functioning

HYDRAA operates through three wings: Asset Protection, Disaster Management, and Logistics Support. Under an IPS-rank Commissioner, reporting to the Municipal Administration and Urban Development (MA&UD) Department rather than to GHMC or HMDA directly. This reporting line is itself a governance choice as it removes lake and drain enforcement from the elected-body-adjacent structures where political influence had historically blunted action, and places it under a state-level, police-led command. The agency’s jurisdiction, the TCUR spans GHMC plus Rangareddy, Medchal-Malkajgiri, and Sangareddy districts up to the Outer Ring Road, and it now commands a force of roughly 2,200 personnel.

Core legal powers (G.O. Ms No. 99, 19 July 2024): protect public assets from encroachment; remove lake/buffer-zone encroachments with GHMC, HMDA, Irrigation, and Revenue; coordinate police enforcement; inspect private premises and remove unsafe structures only on request from another authority; penalise unauthorised advertisements; run disaster response via its own DRF; coordinate with NDRF, SDMA, IMD, NRSA; issue Fire NOCs as entrusted under the Telangana Fire Services Act, 1999.

Critical legal limitation: G.O. 99 grants no independent demolition power. Clause 7.1(iv) states HYDRAA “shall be deemed to be working under” the relevant ULB/planning authority when exercising powers like premises inspection it borrows authority case-by-case from the GHMC Act 1955, HMDA Act, etc. This thin footing is why the state added Section 374-B to the GHMC Act in October 2024, and likely why courts have repeatedly asked “under what authority is HYDRAA acting.”

Operating cycle: identify FTL/buffer-zone encroachment (complaints, satellite monitoring, field surveys) → notice (in principle) → clearance. An NRSC partnership enables satellite monitoring and virtual fencing of vulnerable lakebeds which is a data layer the earlier system lacked. The weekly Prajavani grievance forum (since Jan 2025) lets residents raise complaints directly to the Commissioner, alongside plans for a dedicated environmental-crimes police station being reportedly India’s first. 

Table 1: HYDRAA Budgetary Outlay and Financial Context 

Source: compiled from Government of Telangana, Finance Department Budget Outlay (2026) & (2024), MA&UD Department(2026), 

Performance

HYDRAA’s two-year record is strongest as a disaster-response body: 913 flood-prone spots mapped, a dedicated police station, a 1070 helpline, and direct relief for residents like Secunderabad’s Ranjeeta Dhanapalan, whose 30-year flooding problem was resolved. positioning it as a promising model for flood-prone Indian cities and a real expansion of state capacity to protect ecological assets. 

Table 2: Composition of Land Assets reclaimed and Physical enforcement outlays 

Source:Government of Telangana, HYDRAA Official Press Statement on Two-Year Operational Achievements (2026)

Outputs count what was cleared; outcomes count what stopped happening to people. Fewer families flooded each monsoon(Patny Drain restoration (10 ft to 72 ft) shielded roughly 40,000 families from recurring flooding), fewer streets going underwater(desilting near Ameerpet unclogged a chronic waterlogging point on a metro corridor), fewer hours lost to waterlogged commutes and that’s the shift from acreage-and-demolition numbers to lived relief on the ground. 

Impact

1. International benchmarking: then-Commissioner A.V. Ranganath presented HYDRAA’s lake-restoration and drainage work at the BRICS Disaster Risk Reduction Summit, Puri, July 2026, as a model for sustainable urban development.
2. Overcoming fragmentation: HYDRAA shows a state can move against decades-old encroachment when a politically insulated body gets a narrow mandate and real enforcement power — something the fragmented structure couldn’t.
3. Non-partisan enforcement: action taken against BRS legislators, AIMIM MLAs, and figures like actor Nagarjuna (an alleged ₹400-crore structure on Thammidi Kunta’s buffer zone), reinforcing the government’s “Telangana Bulldozer” image on encroachment.

Impact on city flooding

A harder question: does HYDRAA’s site-by-site model cut citywide flood risk, or just shift it elsewhere? Hyderabad is one interconnected catchment, not isolated lakes. Activist S.Q. Masood notes that “flooding has simply moved from Macca Colony to Bilal Nagar” which suggests fixes at one site can displace water to another without catchment-level modelling (vanshika, 2026). Acreage reclaimed isn’t proof of reduced citywide flooding, though both are reported as if they were the same thing. 

Table 3: HYDRAA’s Strategic Synergy with Sustainable Development Goal 11 (Sustainable Cities & Communities) targets.

Source: Synthesized from United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 11 Targets (UN DESA, 2015) and telangana socio-economic outlook (2026)

 Challenges

Legal and procedural legitimacy

The most consistently litigated issue is the uncertainty over how far HYDRAA can independently exercise demolition and eviction powers, and whether it is acting within or beyond its statutory authority. In N Convention v. State of Telangana, a speaking order granting fifteen days to respond was served at 9:04 am, yet demolition occurred at 7:38 am the same morning, before the notice period had nominally begun (SSC online, n.d.,). The recurring pattern across these cases is not simply that individual demolitions went wrong, but that HYDRAA has operated without a codified Standard Operating Procedure covering survey, verification, notice, hearing, appeal, and action, a gap the High Court has now explicitly flagged as needing remedy (venkatesan, 2026).

Social justice and rehabilitation

Pointing to rehabilitation measures, a National Human Rights Commission complaint was filed over residents rendered homeless by demolitions. At Shankar Nagar along the Musi riverfront, families with 70-plus years of residence face eviction for the Musi River Development Project, seeking relocation nearby rather than to the urban periphery, with no codified resettlement framework comparable to the Land Acquisition Act’s compensation provisions currently in place (Ayesha, 2024).

Scientific and Technical Accuracy

Boundary determination itself has proven contestable rather than settled science. At Sunnam Cheruvu, Survey of India topographic maps measured the lake at 26 acres; a 2016 GHMC re-survey revised this to 32 acres, sweeping in homes residents insist always sat outside the lakebed, and a 255-house clearance proceeded on this contested basis. Ecologist Arun Vasireddy and heritage activist Lubna Sarwath have separately criticised HYDRAA’s restoration approach as unscientific

Transparency and accountability

The High Court has described demolitions as resembling a “war-like situation” and asked whether HYDRAA functions as a “parallel government.” Former finance minister T. Harish Rao accused it of being “weaponised” against opposition legislators. In late July 2026, the High Court directed the state to remove Commissioner A.V. Ranganath, alongside 63 pending contempt petitions calling the agency a “theatre for tyranny” this is a direct judicial finding against its leadership, sharpening the governance question this article opened with (Deepak, 2026). 

Way forward

First, maintain due process of law by following  a 15-day show-cause notice, a reasoned final order, video-graphed demolitions, and a public digital notice portal should be codified into a HYDRAA Act rather than left to case-by-case judicial correction.

Second, scientific mapping and transparency- lake and drain restoration designs should be reviewed by an independent technical panel including local hydrology and irrigation-engineering experts before execution, directly addressing the “unscientific concretisation” critique.

Third, being accountable by providing a statutory resettlement and rehabilitation framework needed for genuine buffer-zone residents by offering compensation and in-situ or near-site relocation rather than displacement to the periphery. Also create a single window for verification before issuing a permit.

Fourth, HYDRAA’s data and public metrics should shift from acreage recovered to flood-incidence reduction at the site level, since the former measures enforcement activity while the latter measures the actual SDG 11 outcome the agency exists to deliver. To make it more sustainable the solutions should be nature based like wetlands, bio-swales and permeable natural beds.

HYDRAA becomes the durable, replicable resilience model its advocates describe, Telangana will need to do what its creation initially bypassed: build the statutory, scientific, sustainable and participatory scaffolding that turns fast enforcement into rule-bound governance.

References

1. Ayesha, M. (2024, october 29). When did Musi beautification become about erasing the poor? Frontline. https://frontline.thehindu.com/environment/musi-riverfront-beautification-demolition-hyderabad-telangana-160-homes-displaced-thames-evictions-congress-government/article68799027.ece 
2. Deepak, p. (2026, july 28). HC orders immediate removal of HYDRAA chief Ranganath. times of india. https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/hyderabad/hc-orders-immediate-removal-of-hydraa-chief-ranganath/articleshow/132669921.cms 
3. samal, d. r., nayak, b. p., & prakash, a. (2025, december 08). Urban flood vulnerability assessment for Hyderabad city, India. springer nature, Volume 2(article number 120 (2025)), 13. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s44327-025-00161-4.  https://doi.org/10.1007/s44327-025-00161-4 
4. SSC online. (n.d.). Telangana HC stays demolition of N. Convention, founded by actor Nagarjuna and entrepreneur Nalla Preetham Reddy Read more at: https://www.scconline.com/blog/post/2024/08/28/telhc-stays-demolition-of-n-convention-founder-actor-nagarjuna/. 
5. swarajya. (2016). How M Visvesvaraya Made Hyderabad Flood Free: Lessons For Smart Cities. swarajya. https://swarajyamag.com/smart-cities/how-m-visvesvaraya-made-hyderabad-flood-free-lessons-for-smart-cities 
6. vanshika. (2026, june 26). The first infrastructure: The human networks behind urban flood response in Hyderabad. India water Portal. https://www.indiawaterportal.org/governance-and-policy/the-first-infrastructure-the-human-networks-behind-urban-flood-response-in-hyderabad 
7. venkatesan. (2026, july 22). Bulldozer demolitions | A guideline without a forum. supreme court observer. https://www.scobserver.in/journal/bulldozer-demolitions-a-guideline-without-a-forum/ (swarajya, 2016, #)
8. Bommala, N. (2026, March 18). Hyderabad’s shrinking lakes trigger HYDRAA Action Plan. Deccan Chronicle. https://www.deccanchronicle.com/southern-states/telangana/hyderabads-shrinking-lakes-trigger-hydraa-action-plan-1944775
9. Correspondent, D. (2026, July 27). Telangana: State clears ₹72 CR for HYDRAA. Deccan Chronicle. https://www.deccanchronicle.com/southern-states/telangana/telangana-state-clears-72-cr-for-hydraa-1974423 
10. Desk, H. W., & Desk, H. W. (2026, July 30). HYDRAA highlights flood mitigation achievements after two years. Hyderabad News Hunt. https://hyderabadnewshunt.com/hydraa-two-years-flood-mitigation-achievements/ 
11. Hydra. (2025, September 15). Hydra Hyderabad Full tank level (FTL) and buffer zones in Telangana – Hydra. Hydra. https://hydra.org.in/ 
12. International Journal of Political Science – rfppl. (n.d.). International Journal of Political Science – Rfppl. https://rfppl.co.in/article/hydra-building-a-disaster-resilient-hyderabad-for-the-future/20401 
13. News Desk. (2024, December 3). Telangana govt releases Rs 50 crore funds to HYDRAA. The Siasat Daily. https://www.siasat.com/telangana-govt-releases-rs-50-crore-funds-to-hydraa-3141903/ 
14. Prakash, A. (n.d.). Hyderabads HYDRAA: Urban Water Body Reclamation | ISB. ISB Executive Education.  https://execed.isb.edu/executive-perspectives/directory/hyderabad-s-hydraa-an-exercise-in-urban-water-body-reclamation?utm_source=organic&utm_medium=organic_search 
15. Sharma, M. K. D. S. &. S. (2025, February 6). HYDRAA – Balancing Development and Justice in Telangana. Live Law. https://www.livelaw.in/law-firms/law-firm-articles-/hydraa-encroachment-buffer-zones-ngt-telangana-irrigation-act-construction-rera-kochhar-co-283125 

About the Contributor

Lahari is a Public Administration and Governance postgraduate from the Central University of Karnataka, with a keen interest in Urban Governance, Public Policy, and Sustainable Development. committed to making governance more inclusive, sustainable and having a tangible impact on citizens’ lives.

Reviewed by 

Sruti halder and Sneha kohli

Acknowledgement 

I am writing to express my sincere gratitude to IMPRI (Impact and Policy Research Institute) for providing me with the opportunity to prepare this policy update article and for fostering a rigorous learning environment that connects research with public policy practice.

Disclaimer

The views and opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views, policies, or positions of IMPRI (Impact and Policy Research Institute) or any other affiliated organisation.

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