DC debate: Vijayawada as Andhra Pradesh's new Capital, how correct is the decision?

Seemandhra snubbed in Andhra Pradesh capital race:

In the process of bifurcation of the erstwhile Andhra Pradesh, it is the Rayalseema region that was most blatantly wronged. Telangana came to the composite state with a medieval town as its capital and has now walked away with a world-class city (built at the cost of all the three regions) yielding enormous revenues and employment opportunities.

Coastal Andhra has managed to get a Centrally-funded mega irrigation project (estimated outlay Rs 40,000 crore) on Godavari, which they could not build all these years for various reasons.

 It is the Rayalaseema region, which had the capital on its soil, before the integration for historical reasons, that has now been robbed of it!

The investment on the new capital region, which would be ultimately to the order of not less than Rs 1 lakh crore is now going into an area which is among the wealthier part of the state, at the cost of Rayalaseema.

In the process, the truncated state of Andhra Pradesh has lost an opportunity to build a well-planned green-field capital at a place acceptable to all. If the Sivaramakrishnan Committee is emphatic about anything, it is about the VGTM area being most unsuitable for the capital region. The attempts of the government to lobby with the committee and to flood the committee with claims in its favour, could not influence it.

By now it is clear, the principal Opposition party, YSR Congress has also connived with the government, notwithstanding all the show of opposition. It has a parallel in the Congress and BJP coming together to undo Andhra Pradesh.

The VGTM region is the rice, vegetable and fruit bowl with standing crops round the year. Nothing can be more irresponsible than to convert it into a mega city, with eight-lane highways, outer ring road, Metro, international airport, truck terminals etc. Its alluvial soil would not support high-rise constructions, leading to lateral spread of the city and gobbling up more and more of the delta, twice as big as Goa in area.

Apart from this, the inhabitants of the mega city have to cope year after year with problems of cyclones, bad drainage and water-logging. The government’s plan to take over degraded forests at Nuzvid, Mangalagiri and Amaravati, for development is an anti-environment step.

Andhra Pradesh has only 23 pre cent of the land area (including degraded forest) under forest cover, as against the prescribed norm of 33 per cent. A responsible government would make efforts to regenerate forest in these areas rather than appropriate them for development; they even want to take over temple land, which is not right.

Thanks to the hype created by the short-sighted, money-spinning realtors who seem to have driven this idea, housing in the capital region would be unbearably expensive for the middle-class residents and beyond the reach of the low-income groups.

It is also not possible to bring in any town-planning measures to an area given to thriving in slum culture. As a wit has prophesied, the truncated state will have a truncated capital! By persisting with this plan driven more by pelf than vision, we would be killing the goose that lays golden eggs by destroying a thriving agriculture system. At the cost of it all, the government would be creating a capital without any identity of its own. An opportunity to build an elegant well-planned spacious capital city that would reflect our culture is lost and lost for all time!

By Retired IPS Officer- C. Anjaneya Reddy

Read: North-facing capital good for Andhra Pradesh

Vijayawada has all that capital needs:

Vijayawada is about 270 km from Hyderabad and is equidistant from all corners of the state. It is located on the banks of the Krishna and Budameru rivers. It is the second largest city in Andhra Pradesh with an area of 61.88 sq. km and a population of approximately 15 lakh. The city has been recognised as a “Global City of the Future” by McKinsey Quarterly. It is one of the commercial hubs of Andhra Pradesh with a GDP of $3 billion in 2010, and is expected to grow up to $17 billion by 2025.

According to ministry of urban development, it is the cleanest city in AP. The twin cities of Vijayawada and Guntur, divided by River Krishna, can soon emerge as a metro city that can attract investments and have a vibrant social life, as they have got enough population and good connectivity.

Vijayawada, well-connected by National Highways, Gannavaram airport, and rain lines, is clearly the gateway to South India. The fact that Vijayawada is well-connected through rail and road, makes it one of the main hubs of commercial activities. Agriculture, commercial trade, tourism, industries, transportation and tertiary sectors etc., are the major sectors that contribute to the economy of the city.

Vijayawada is famous for processing of agricultural products, automobile body building, hardware, textile,  consumer goods and small-scale industries.
Agro-based industries for cotton, turmeric, Virginia tobacco etc., are located in the surrounding areas. There are also oil, dal and rice mills located at Kondapalli. The two well-equipped industrial estates in Vijayawada are Autonagar and another one near Kondapalli.

The Jawaharlal Nehru Autonagar Industrial Estate in Vijayawada is one of the largest auto industry hubs of Asia. It is also a hub for storage, bottling and transportation of petroleum products of all major companies like BPCL, GAIL, HPCL, IOC, Reliance etc. Vijayawada is well connected with the rest of the country by National Highways. Two National Highways the NH 5 (now NH-16) from Chennai to Kolkata, and the NH 9 (now NH-65) from Machilipatnam to Pune pass through the city connecting it to other parts of the country.

Vijayawada railway station with A-1 status is one of the important railway junctions  in India, situated on the Howrah-Chennai mainline and Delhi-Chennai line. It is the busiest station, handling more than 320 trains (both passenger and freight) per day, next only to Howrah and Mumbai. Vijayawada is also well-connected by air.

The domestic airport at Gannavaram, about 19 km from the city, connects Vijayawada already to Hyderabad, Bengaluru, Chennai, Mumbai, Jaipur, Delhi, Ahmedabad, Visakhapatnam and Madurai.

Vijayawada is home to respected institutions of higher learning such as Dr NTR University of Health Sciences, Acharya Nagarjuna University, KL University, School of Planning and Architecture, National Institute of Design.

Connectivity and well-established infrastructure ate factors that are important for selection of the capital city. More than 80 per cent of people are satisfied with the announcement and it is pertinent to know that there was no opposition to the announcement. Clearly, Vijayawada, which has all pre-requisites for establishing the capital city, is ideal for administrative convenience, economic growth, and social and cultural development.

By TD Parliamentary Party Leader- Sujana Chowdary