T Narsipur KSIC land saved as much awaited Government Order passed to drop stadium project

Mysuru: The state government has passed the much awaited Government Order (GO) to drop the 5 acre land of T Narsipur KSIC raw silk reeling unit for the proposed stadium.

Principal Secretary of State Department of Horticulture and Sericulture, N Pramila, passed the GO withdrawing its previous order passed on July 14, 2025 to freely hand over the five acre land on survey nos 22/1A, 22/2, 23/1D, 23/2 at Bhyrapura of T Narsipur taluk of Mysuru district to the Department of Youth Empowerment and Sports (DYES) for the proposed Rs 6 Crore worth stadium announced by Chief Minister in 2024-25 State budget, KSIC MD Zehera Naseem informed DH. 

KSIC T Narsipur unit General Manager S K Manjula informed that they will now initiate a process with Mysuru district administration to get the land records formally transferred back from DYES to KSIC. 

There was no bound for happiness for the 1090 employees of KSIC including 190 employees of KSIC T Narasipura raw reeling unit and two weaving units at Mysuru and Channapatna, Mysore silk lovers, environmental organisations, and various associations and leaders who took up the movement to retain land of KSIC mother unit which was crucial for its survival, and to save the Mysore Silk brand.

DH was the first to explore and expose how the KSIC mother unit and Mysore silk brand itself will be under threat if the proposed stadium comes up on that 5 acre land. The newspaper came up with a series of 15 articles based on documents and spot visit, highlighting all the angles comprehensively from February 14.

First article on KSIC T Narsipur filature published in DH on February 14.

DH had elaborately voiced the movement taken up by KSIC employees, Environmental and other organisations led by Parashuramegowda of Parisarakkaagi Naavu. 

Leader of the opposition R Ashoka, had tweeted the articles published in DH on X, joining the movement. Ashoka raised the issue in the Legislative Assembly on March 9.

In response to the query, sericulture minister K Venkatesh had announced the state government's decision to drop the stadium project on KSIC land in the Legislative Assembly session on March 9. But the formal GO was awaited. 

As per the GO, the technical committee led by Mysuru DC G Lakshmikanth Reddy and other officials along with MLC S Yathindra visited the KSIC unit in T Narsipur on March 5. 

KSIC MD Zehera Naseem and KSIC GM S K Manjula explained and gave a report on how critical that land was for KSIC's survival and expansion. The technical committee has opined that this 5 acre land is not technically feasible for the construction of the stadium. 

Naseem had also formally written to the State Government on March 16 to withdraw the previous GO and come up with a fresh GO to drop the land for the stadium and transfer the land records from DYES to KSIC T Narsipur unit.

In that, she had highlighted that the KSIC mother unit is the foundation for the KSIC brand. With the raw silk yarn produced here, the weaving units at Channapatna and Mysuru produce world famous Mysore silk sarees.  

Highlighting the importance of this 5 acre land, Naseem had pointed out that the unit requires 10 lakh liters of Kapila river water per day as they are installing four more automatic reeling machines. The soft water of Kapila river was crucial in coming up with high quality soft raw silk yarn.

The gradient for the underground pipeline which pumps this water from the Kapila River to KSIC was in this 5 acre land taken over by DYES. Even as there have already been notices by Karnataka State Pollution Control Board, KSIC had planned to establish a 3 lakh litre per day Effluent Treatment Plant on 1.5 acre land in this same land taken over by DYES.

There are already 5tph (tonne per hour) and 2tph boilers in KSIC factory unit, and they have planned to establish one more boiler and it was not safe to establish the stadium next to this factory area. 

With the rise in demand for Mysore silk sarees, they have already taken measures to install more advanced machinery to expand and enhance their production. Hence all the available land of KSIC units is crucial to further enhance their Mysore Silk Saree production. 

Secretary of Sericulture department R Girish took steps for the Government order. Noting all these points Principal Secretary Pramila has passed this GO 

It should be recalled that the technical report submitted in 2025 itself by Naseem and Manjula had clearly highlighted the inevitability of retaining 5 acre land for saving KSIC mother unit-raw silk reeling unit and two other weaving units and Mysore silk brand.

They had appealed for the scientific survey before taking over land. Without a survey, the officials of DYES installed the boundary stone on February 20. Owing to fear of closure of the unit and losing jobs, 190 employees of T Narsipura filature stopped producing raw silk reeling yarns and began a protest from February 21.

The employees of KSIC Channapatna and Mysuru  units stopped weaving Mysore silk sarees on February 24 and joined the protest.

Parashuramegowda of Parisara Balaga and Parisarakkaagi Naavu led the movement to save 550 trees and the biodiversity in this 5 acre land of KSIC. Environmentalists including Ravi Bale, Prabha, Bhagya, Gayathri, Suguna, Anjana, Sindhuvalli Akbar, Gantaiah, members of Mysore Grahakara Parishat including founding working president Bhamy V Shenoy, and others, members of Bhoomithayi Ulisi Horaata Samithi led by K S Nanjundegowda, Jai Karnataka Parishat led by Narayan, members of Raitha Sangha, and other organisations were part of the movement. 

Followed by reports which appeared in DH, advocate Arun Kumar and his daughter Pragia Ketura decided to file a PIL along with founding working president of Mysore Grahakara Parishat Bhamy V Shenoy to save the unit.

MP Yaduveer and Arun Kumar inspected the spot, discussed with staff. They even met Chief Minister Siddaramaiah at Mysuru Airport and appealed to stop using KSIC land for the stadium. Meanwhile T Narsipur taluk in-charge secretary KAS officer M K Savitha, explained Mysuru district in-charge minister H C Mahadevappa about how the stadium proposal would affect the unit.

Mahadevappa directed Mysuru DC G Lakshmikanth Reddy to come up with a technical report on this. Mysuru District Congress Committee rural President B J Vijaykumar had also convinced Chief Minister Siddaramaiah to drop the stadium project on this KSIC land. 

The raw silk yarn reeling unit, spread over 12.32 acres at T Narsipur, processes this to 250 to 300 kg silk yarn per day. With this, the raw silk yarn produced in T Narsipur unit, the silk weaving units in Channapatna and Mysuru with 319 looms, produce 400 Mysore silk sarees per day. 

Despite an increase in production from 280 sarees to 400 sarees per day in the past five years, the KSIC has a demand for at least 600 more sarees per day.

Though there are 850 trees in the entire 12 acre 32 gunta land in KSIC T Narsipur unit premises including 552 trees in the land acquired by Sports department, the KSPCB had earlier opined that this green belt was not sufficient. As per the industries act, they need to have 30 per cent of green belt. So they needed 3 acre land for the plantation of another 500 trees and this land was also in the land acquired by DYES. They also needed the acquired land, to establish canteen, parking space, creche for staff besides expansion.