BRS working president K. T. Rama Rao walked into the Union IT Ministry in New Delhi on Tuesday, July 28, 2026, with a four-point ask: bring India's next wave of AI and deep-tech infrastructure to Telangana's smaller cities — and use the foundations his own government already built to do it.

Rama Rao met Union Minister for Electronics and Information Technology Ashwini Vaishnaw to formally request that the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) extend its flagship national programmes to Tier-II cities in Telangana — specifically Warangal, Karimnagar, and Khammam. The pitch was deliberate: don't build from scratch, build on what exists.

Four Asks, One Argument: Leverage What BRS Built

The requests were specific. First, establish an IndiaAI Centre or IndiaAI Data Lab in Warangal, tapping the city's existing IT infrastructure and academic institutions. Second, set up an STPI Centre of Entrepreneurship in either Karimnagar or Khammam, focused on artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, semiconductor design, and deep tech. Third, add another STPI node in a separate emerging Tier-II city in the state. Fourth, ensure future MeitY programmes on AI and digital innovation are routed to Telangana's Tier-II belt — not just Hyderabad.

The through-line in every ask: the IT Towers and related infrastructure established during the BRS government's tenure between 2014 and 2023 are already in place. KTR's argument to the Centre is that the sunk cost of state investment should now be activated by national programmes rather than left underutilised.

Why Warangal, Karimnagar, Khammam — and Why Now

Software Technology Parks of India (STPI), a MeitY agency, has been opening centres in Tier-II and Tier-III cities since the 1990s to push software exports and innovation beyond the major metros. India's IndiaAI mission — which funds data labs, compute infrastructure, and AI research centres — is the newer vehicle, and states across the country have been lobbying to host its nodes.

Telangana's Tier-II cities have long sat in the shadow of Hyderabad's dominant tech corridor. Warangal, the state's second-largest city, has universities and a nascent IT presence; Karimnagar and Khammam have infrastructure built during the BRS era but limited national programme coverage. KTR's meeting with Vaishnaw is a direct attempt to close that gap before the next round of MeitY site allocations and budget decisions.

'Strengthening Telangana's Tier-II IT ecosystem would benefit both Telangana and India,' Rama Rao said in his post, 'and I hope the Union Government responds positively to these requests.' No commitments from the Ministry were announced.

Whether MeitY moves — and how fast — will be the real test of whether centre-state coordination on tech decentralisation moves beyond goodwill meetings into budget lines.