Visakhapatnam to be the capital of Andhra Pradesh, declares CM Jagan Mohan Reddy  

Visakhapatnam will be the capital of southern Andhra Pradesh state, Chief Minister Jagan Mohan Reddy announced on Tuesday, even as a Supreme Court ruling is pending on whether the state government can develop three capitals.

The chief minister made the announcementat the International Diplomatic Alliance Meet and Curtain Raiser for Andhra Pradesh Global Investors Summit 2023 organised in New Delhi.

The announcement of a new capital comes nine years after Telanganastate was carved out of Andhra and Hyderabad city was assigned as its capital.

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"Here I am to invite you to Visakhapatnam which is going to be our capital in the days to come. I myself would also be shifting over to Visakhapatnam in the months to come as well," he told the investors at the meeting.

Amaravati as a state capital had been in contention for a long ever since the formation of Telangana. In 2015, the then CM N Chandrababu Naidu-led government acquired over 33,000 acres of land from farmers to develop Amaravati as the capital of the state.

But after Jagan Mohan Reddy got elected in 2019, he decided to develop three state capitals—Visakhapatnam as the executive capital, Amaravati as the legislative capital and Kurnool as the judicial capital, following which he passed appropriate legislation.

Last year in November, the state government passed a bill in the assembly in November, repealing the controversial AP Decentralisation and Inclusive Development of All Regions Act, 2020, which was intended to establish three capitals for the state.

Without putting any timeframe, Jagan, speaking on the floor of the assembly said the government would come out with a "comprehensive, complete and better" bill after plugging loopholes in the previous version.

In March last year, the Andhra Pradesh High Court ruled against the three capitals and directed the government to develop Amaravati as the state capital as envisaged.

The court on March 3, 2022, said the state legislature lacked the competence to make any legislation for shifting, bifurcating or trifurcating the capital.

The state government then filed a petition in the Supreme Court challenging the High Court Order.

(With inputs from agencies)

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