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New Restaurant Planned for Former Forest Hills Baluchi's Site, Owner Says

By Ewa Kern-Jedrychowska | August 25, 2016 5:11pm
 A new restaurant is slated to open soon at the former Forest Hills Baluchi’s site, the owners say.
A new restaurant is slated to open soon at the former Forest Hills Baluchi’s site, the owners say.
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DNAinfo/Ewa Kern-Jedrychowska

QUEENS — The deteriorating site of the former Baluchi's in Forest Hills, which was closed by the Department of Health about a year and a half ago, will be renovated to make way for a new restaurant, the owner said.

The new eatery will open at 113-30 Queens Blvd. in about 3 months, according to Rohan Aggarwal, who is an owner and the son of Baluchi's founder Rakesh Aggarwal. 

Baluchi’s, a once popular Indian chain, has in recent years closed all its restaurants

But Aggarwal told DNAinfo New York Thursday that his new venture is not related to Baluchi’s.

He also said that he was not ready to reveal details about his new endeavor other than that the space is currently undergoing a "full renovation."

“We want to offer something new to the neighborhood,” he said.

According to documents filed with the Department of Buildings on Aug. 3, the $45,000 makeover will comprise of “interior and exterior renovation,” including repairs of ceiling and walls.

Aggarwal said that the crumbling facade will also be restored.

The space have been deteriorating since Baluchi’s was shuttered in February last year after inspectors found mice and cockroaches inside, according to the DOH.

In May last year, Aggarwal told DNAinfo that the space would be remodeled into a lounge-like restaurant that would open in a couple months. 

But months went by and the site remained empty.

In January, a representative for P.C. Richard and Son, which owns the property, said that the company was planning to start looking for a new tenant. The representative confirmed earlier this week that a new restaurant is coming to the site but declined to elaborate.

Aggarwal said that the space remained empty because it was a matter of "figuring out what to do with the place."