The Hyderabad that was and the city that it is now

Aerial view of Hyderabad | Photo credit: Serish Nanisetti

Does anyone else remember Hyderabad? The city with sukoon, fursat and chai. A city where people turned off the lights at home and young men gathered under streetlights? A city where friends and families watched movies at Sangeet, Anand, Skyline, Lighthouse, Shanti, Amba and Manohar cinemas. And would young men sneak into a show at Lamba or Tivoli?

A city that has gone from rickshaw peddling to autorickshaw drivers (half return after 9pm) – to app-based price hikes? A city that had boundaries: “androon” for the city and “bairoon” for the suburbs? The time Patanchera was served by Andhra Pradesh Road Transport Corporation suburban bus service? But for people in Telangana towns like Warangal, Nalgonda and Gadwal, it was ‘Patnam’; and Secunderabad was ‘Lashkar’.

When G. Kasturi of The Hindu landed in Hyderabad to select an office site in 1975, it took him all of four minutes to reach the Begumpet office. It was also the year that the Hyderabad Urban Development Authority announced the master plan for the Hyderabad city area, which covered about 173 square kilometers. Now HUDA is HMDA, MCH is GHMC and it can take almost an hour to reach Begumpet from Rajiv Gandhi International Airport in Shamshabad.

New visitors, tourists, job seekers, parents of employees working in Hyderabad pour in from the airport and take the eight-lane Outer Ring Road (ORR), which is simply a must-see. If it is day, the glare of the city greets them; at night it is the glitter of towers touching the sky.

For old residents, it’s like a switch was flipped while they slept. “This city changes every few months,” “unrecognizable” and “the last time I was here, this flyover wasn’t there” are often heard from people who still remember the phrase “twin cities”.

It was in one corner of Hyderabad, beyond the Musi River, that the IT revolution began in Hyderabad – and at the same time in India. Inside the Administration Staff College of India (ASCI), right next to the library, is a marker commemorating the beginning of this revolution with the date September 1, 1976 – just three days before the launch of The Hindu’s Hyderabad edition. The computer and library building was inaugurated by the then President of India, Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed.

Author Dinesh Sharma traces the rise of Hyderabad’s software boom to Electronics Corporation of India Limited, which resulted from India’s nuclear quest, ASCI and the exit of IBM Computers after the Janata Party government tightened foreign exchange norms to bring in multinationals like Coca-Cola and IBM.

At ASCI, the software work translated into simple packages of financial accounting, vehicle planning and brand tables that were mined locally and eventually exported to Eastern Bloc countries such as Bulgaria.

The isolationist policies of the Janata Party regime changed after Indira Gandhi returned to power.

In 1982, the Union Cabinet gave its nod to a new computer policy, just as India switched to color television for the Asiad. In 1986, under the leadership of Rajiv Gandhi, India began allowing the export of software using “satellite data links”.

A new era began in Hyderabad when India unveiled the Software Technology Parks scheme in June 1991. Within days, Hyderabad STP started functioning from five floors of Maitrivanam complex in Ameerpet. Software Technology Parks changed the software game by setting up ground stations for dedicated data links to the rest of the world.

A small IT firm in Ameerpet was no longer small. It was as big as her dreams, and the young men and women who trained to enter this hot job market were not disappointed as the boom continued. The Madhapur STP was the nucleus that grew into Hyderabad’s growth story – one that has now evolved into an ecosystem of AI, visual effects and a Global Capability Center that attracts talent from around the world.

According to STPI data, “Total exports from STPI-registered units under STPI-Hyderabad increased from ₹ 4.76 crore in 1992-93 to ₹ 1.45,002.76 crore in FY 2024-25. A growth of 304,617% which you can now see when you are in the western part of Hyderabad.”

(serish.n@thehindu.co.in)

Published – 04 Sep 2026 05:30 IST