Andhra Governor approves bills for 3 capitals, Opposition to move court

Andhra Pradesh Governor Biswabhushan Harichandan has approved the contentious three capitals Bill on 31 July. He also gave his assent to the Bill to scrap the Capital Region Development Authority (CRDA). The state is going to have three capitals with Visakhapatnam as executive capital, Amaravati as legislative capital and Kurnool as the judicial capital.

Despite both the bills being passed in the state Assembly in January, they were referred by the chairman to the selection committee. On 19 July, the state government sent two bills to the Governor for his approval. The government of Y.S. Jaganmohan Reddy intended to decentralize the development in the three regions of North Andhra, costal Andhra and Rayalaseema regions.

On the other hand BJP does not want to interfere into this matter, with its spokesperson saying, “The Central government does not want to interfere here as the BJP wanted Amaravati as the state capital but the YSRCP government decided otherwise.”

The Opposition parties like the TDP, the Jenasena, etc, protested against the idea of three capitals. TDP chief N. Chandrababu Naidu said, “The government is behaving against the will of the people. We want only one state and one state capital. As per the bifurcation act, there must be only one capital.

This same Jaganmohan Reddy supported Amaravati as capital on the floor of the House when he was the leader of Opposition. The Bills did not get through the legislative council. The governor should not have approved these bills. We will contest this decision.”

“The farmers of Amaravati who gave their land or were forced are describing this as a black day and they feel cheated,” CPI state secretary Ramakrishna said.