Clinton's Hyderabad Stopover only for 3 Hrs

After all the hype, this city may have to be content with just a three-hour token stopover by U.S. President Bill Clinton. Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Nara Chandrababu Naidu may have pulled off a major coup by securing a visit by Clinton to Hyderabad, but that's all the time the U.S. President is likely to spend here on March 24, state government officials said. Naidu managed to persuade Clinton to make the trip to Hyderabad in preference to Bangalore, India's Silicon Valley, and unprecedented preparations have gone into hosting the visit. Though Chief Secretary V. Anand Rau refused to confirm the itinerary and timings, saying they are yet to be finalized, M.V.S. Prasad, Political Secretary, told India Abroad News Service : "(Most probably) Clinton will arrive here at 12.30 p.m. and leave at 4.00 p.m." Rau told India Abroad News Service that White House officials were yet to confirm with him the exact timings and schedule despite the fact that there are only eight days left for the visit. "But this is not a cause for concern because we have been working on the visit for quite some time and we will manage even at a short notice," he added. Prasad said a White House team which arrived in the city on Tuesday would be meeting state government officials but it was not certain if the itinerary would be disclosed. Reports, however, said according to a tentative schedule received from the Ministry of External Affairs, Clinton will arrive by a special aircraft at the Rajiv Gandhi international airport and will be received by Governor C. Rangarajan, Chief Minister Naidu, Director General of state police H.J. Dora and some protocol officers. He will be accorded a 10-minute ceremonial reception at the airport premises, which will be attended only by Naidu, his cabinet colleagues and select dignitaries, the reports added. Clinton will then visit the Cyber Towers in Hi-Tech City, where he is likely to address a 200-member gathering of prominent industrialists and IT experts for an hour, and proceed to a prominent health center to attend a function in connection with the World Tuberculosis Day, Prasad said. But two more places are being considered for a visit -- a nearby village and the arts and crafts village in Shilparamam.This means Clinton will neither be staying at a hotel nor visiting tourist places such as the Golconda Fort, the Salarjung Museum and the historic Charminar. This will also leave out the Confederation of Indian Industry's environment promotion venture at Madhapur, the Indian Institute of Information Technology, the Satyam Technology center and the Indo-American center for International Studies, formerly called the American Studies Research center, which were shortlisted by two sub-committees dealing with the visit. Clinton will not even eat lunch in the city. It has been arranged on board the aircraft itself, a report quoted sources as saying. Meanwhile, officials have denied that Clinton's itinerary may have been shortened due to the recent seizure of 500 kg of explosives in Nizamabad and the March 7 landmine blast by the People's War Group (PWG) that killed Panchayati Raj Minister A. Madhav Reddy. Prasad said U.S. officials had not expressed any concern over the security issue and the recovery of explosives and the landmine blast had nothing to do with the Clinton visit.