hyderabad if the gachibowli sports stadium is now a popular venue for high profile marriages and filmi events then the adjoining sports tower built to accommodate sportspersons may soon be converted into a plush star hotel the sports authority of andhra pradesh saap is going all out to woo prospective investors and hotel industry majors to lease out its highrise building consisting of 13 floors in an attempt to revive itself financially a few days ago a prebid meeting was organized by saap which was attended by the potential vendors related to the hotel industry apart from briefing them and showing them around the property the saap authorities are also learnt to have discussed various business models pertaining to this towers which even included the possibility of service apartments or residential flats along with the hotel the sports authority is planning to call for tenders in the coming few days the sports tower which was built in 2007 for the world military games had become more of a burden then an asset for saap this tower with its 468 rooms consists of 13 floors along with a ground floor and a cellar it was built with a cost of rs 70 crore of which it raised rs 48 crore through loans from a nationalized bank even as the towers lie unused since 2007 a large sum of money is going towards repayment of loan and maintenance of this venue in 200708 rs 3 crore was paid as loan installment in 200809 rs 5 crore in 200910 rs 2 crore in 201011 rs 7 crore and in 201112 the amount has shot up to rs 14 crore this apart the sports association is also spending close to rs 30 lakh towards maintenance of the place every year this is not the first time that the body had tried to lease out this property a similar attempt was made a couple of years ago which did not yield results however the officials are confident it will fructify this time t r k rao vicechairman and managing director saap said previously the investors did not show interest because they thought it was not the right time to take up the project owing to market trends this time a few have shown interest and we are working on it we will be leasing it out for a minimum period of 25 years we will also try to make an arrangement once the property is leased out in order to provide accommodation to the sportsmen whenever there is a sporting event rao also hoped that if this project takes off then it would help saap to become a selfsufficient body