Two days ago, the Centre has released a revised map of India following the bifurcation of Jammu and Kashmir to separate Ladakh and declaring them as Union territories. The map was prepared by Survey of India.
While everything was fine with the map, there was one thing that was conspicuously missing. All the states have their own capital cities, including Telangana which has Hyderabad.
But not Andhra Pradesh. The name of its capital city – Amaravati has not been mentioned.
What could be the reason for the omission of Amaravati from Andhra Pradesh? There are different versions doing rounds in the media circles.
The map of Survey India has mentioned twice Hyderabad as the administrative capital for both Telangana and Andhra Pradesh.
It is true as per the AP Reorganisation Act, as Hyderabad will remain a joint capital for a period of 10 years, i.e. till 2024.
But way back in December 2014, the then Chandrababu Naidu government declared Amaravati as the capital city of Andhra Pradesh and an act to that effect was passed in the state assembly.
Even Prime Minister Narendra Modi laid the foundation stone for Amaravati in October 2015 and all the correspondence from the centre invariably indicates Amaravati as the capital.
So, why did Survey of India not mention Amaravati in the map?
The YSRC leaders say it is mainly because the previous Naidu government had not issued a gazette notification declaring Amaravati as the capital. That is precisely why the Centre has not mentioned it.
But the TDP leaders say the Jagan government has indicated to the Centre that it is shifting the capital from Amaravati and is looking for a new capital city and hence, Amaravati was omitted in the map.
“Gazette notification is not an issue at all, as the Central government in all its correspondence and reports mentions only Amaravati as the capital of AP. Only because Jagan told the centre about his plans to change the capital, Amaravati was not mentioned in the map,” they said.
