Ever since YSR Congress party president Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy came to power in Andhra Pradesh, his detractors have been spreading fake news extensively in the social media that there is a flight of capital from Andhra.
After coming to power, Jagan took a few serious decisions like review of all ongoing projects approved by the previous Telugu Desam Party government headed by N Chandrababu Naidu that smacked of massive corruption, stalling of works on Polavaram and Amaravati, review of power purchase agreements with solar and wind power companies that were causing huge loss to the state exchequer and introduction of 75 per cent reservation for locals in private sector.
Though there were not many complaints from industrial sector over Jagan’s decisions, his political rivals have started a campaign against him stating that industries are scared of coming to AP and investors are hesitating in putting their money in various projects; and that those who had signed agreements in the past are also withdrawing their plans.
Take for instance, the proposed plan of Gujarat-based Adani group to invest Rs 70,000 cr in a span of 20 years to set up the biggest solar-powered data centre of 5 GW capacity in Visakhapatnam.
The project was signed in January 2019 between Adani group and then Andhra Pradesh government headed by N Chandrababu Naidu.
This was projected to be AP's single-largest investment aimed at giving a boost to India's technology infrastructure and the concept of green data centres.
However, nothing much was heard about the project later because of elections and the formation of the new government.
Though there was no official statement from Adani group, the anti-Jagan forces started a campaign that Adani had changed his mind and is planning to shift the data centre to Hyderabad, as there was no word of encouragement from the Jagan government.
Enquiries revealed that there are just rumours being spread by vested interests working against the Jagan government.
Sources said the Adani group will go ahead with its biggest data centre project in Visakhapatnam, while setting up a smaller project in Hyderabad of 100-200 MW capacity.
“In fact, they are planning another one at Chennai as well, apart from Hyderabad. But the Vizag project, which is the biggest in Asia, will continue. It will propel several internet bandwidth-related start-ups in the region. The government has recently handed over the land to Adanis for the project,” the source said.
