Even as the Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy government revived the steps for shifting of administrative capital from Amaravati to Visakhapatnam by getting the three capitals bills passed by the state assembly on Tuesday, it also got the budgetary allocation for the “new capital.”
In the annual budget presented by finance minister Buggana Rajendranath Reddy, there was a proposal for allocation of Rs 500 crore for creation of necessary infrastructure in the “new capital.”
Besides, another Rs 189 crore had been allocated for land pooling in the new capital region. However, it was not mentioned specifically as to what this new capital is – whether it is Amaravati or Visakhapantam.
Some officials say the new capital was referring only to Amaravati, as the government is planning to create three capitals and so, it would have said three new capitals, not just one new capital.
Moreover, the amount released for land pooling in the new capital would mean, payment of annuity for farmers who had given lands to Amaravati under land pooling.
“Since the government has proposed to increase the annuity payment to the farmers, the allocation has also gone up,” they said.
However, some others say Jagan would not allocate any money for Amaravati, which he is anyway dumping.
“He is planning to develop Visakhapatnam as the new capital and Rs 500 crore is only an initial amount to be spent on creating infrastructure like construction of secretariat and other office buildings. Even in Visakhapatnam, there is a plan to acquire land through land pooling,” they said.
In the first budget, too, the Jagan government allocated Rs 500 crore for Amaravati (the name was specifically mentioned in the budget), but hardly any amount was spent on the same. The farmers who gave away their lands are still fighting for retention of Amaravati as the capital city!
