Lakshmana Venkat Kuchi
Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister YS Jaganmohan Reddy last week reignited the controversy over the state capital after he declared that Visakhapatnam will be the capital of the truncated state, a move that political circles see as ‘revenge’ against Telugu Desam Party whose leaders are accused of making money from real estate deals with “insider knowledge” on the location of the state capital.
Telugu Desam supremo and the CM when the state was bifurcated had taken a decision to locate the capital adjacent to Vijayawada, at Amaravati, and had acquired thousands of acres of land from the farming community for housing government establishments in the region.
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In December 2014, the Chandrababu Naidu government announced the creation of a world-class greenfield capital city in over 7,000 sq km area at Amaravati and set up AP Capital Region Development Authority (APCRDA) through legislation in the state assembly to develop the capital city.
The foundation stone for the new capital Amaravati was laid on October 22, 2015, by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
Now all this sparked off a real estate boom in this region and it shot up to astronomical levels, and allegations are that the TDP leaders made super windfall profits from real estate deals.
Now, after Jagan Mohan Reddy ousted TDP from power in 2019, he came up with the three-capital plan for Andhra Pradesh, in a bid to devalue the lands in Amravati and those nearby that the TDP leaders allegedly bought up cheap and were profiting from them.
On December 17, 2019, Jagan suddenly came up with the idea of three capital cities – the executive capital at Visakhapatnam, the judicial capital at Kurnool and the legislative capital at Amaravati. But in subsequent legal battles, the three-capital plan was shelved, but the Chief Minister appears adamant about making Visakhapatnam the capital of the state.
On Tuesday, addressing a press conference in Delhi to invite entrepreneurs to the Global Investors Summit in Vishakapatnam, declared that “Vishakapatnam will soon become the capital city of Andhra Pradesh.”
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It was thought that the CM had dropped his three capitals plan after the High Court came out with an adverse verdict, following which the CM withdrew the bills relating to the setting up of three capitals in the assembly. But, he followed up this with an announcement that he will come up with more comprehensive and water-tight bills for creating three capitals again.
On Tuesday in Delhi, Jaganmohan Reddy reignited the capital controversy of the truncated state when he told media persons, “Here I am to invite people to the Global Investors Summit in Vishakapatnam, which is going to be the capital soon. I will also be shifting to Vishakapatnam, which is going to be our capital soon.” This sparked angry reactions from the Telugu Desam party leaders.
“I invite you to our beautiful state for the Andhra Pradesh Global Investors Summit to be held on the 3rd & 4th of March in Visakhapatnam. Experience the ease of doing business in our state and partake in our vibrant culture,” the AP Chief Minister said.
