- Almost two years ago, Jagan Mohan Reddy, the newly elected CM of Andhra Pradesh, told the state legislative assembly that, the state will have three capitals.
- Two years down the line, after a series of petitions, protests, and criticism from people across the political spectrum, the government has decided to repeal the controversial decision.
- Jagan’s stupid decisions have led to massive public anger against him and his government.
Almost two years ago, Jagan Mohan Reddy, the newly elected CM of Andhra Pradesh, told the state legislative assembly that, the state will have three capitals in a South Africa like setup, where Amaravati may continue to function as the state’s legislative capital, but the executive capital will be shifted to Visakhapatnam while judicial capital to be shifted to Kurnool- a city in Western Andhra Pradesh.
“Decentralization is the real concept. We should also change. Countries like South Africa have three capitals. We may also have three capitals,” said Reddy at that time.
Two years down the line, after a series of petitions, protests, and criticism from people across the political spectrum, the government has decided to repeal the controversial decision. Bugganna Rajendranath Reddy, the Minister for Finance, Planning, and Legislative Affairs introduced the Andhra Pradesh Decentralisation and Inclusive Development of All Regions Repeal Bill, 2021, which was passed unanimously through a voice vote.
Amaravati was the brainchild of Naidu, who invested political and economic capital to establish the city as the capital of the newly divided state, whose capital went to Telangana.
After the Reddy government came to power, it ordered to review many projects sanctioned by the Naidu government like the development of Amravati as startup capital, which put the investment by the Singapore government at risk, and review of renewable energy projects for which the government formed a high-level negotiation committee (HLNC).
Under the leadership of Jagan Mohan Reddy, the Andhra Pradesh government refused to buy power from the renewable energy projects, as agreed by the previous TDP government.
In order to settle the political scores, the Reddy government is doing immense damage to the state of Andhra Pradesh, which already is under enormous debt due to the populist decision of the Reddy government.
Previously the Union government informed the Upper House that since assuming chair in April 2019, Reddy’s government had availed a sum of Rs 56,076 crore as loans from various public sector banks. Kanakamedala Ravindra Kumar of the opposition Telugu Desam Party (TDP) had posed the question and Bhagwat Karad, the Minister of State in the Ministry of Finance replied with the jaw-dropping numbers. The state already has a debt burden of Rs 3,73,140 crore as of November 2020.
According to an Economic Times report, the state government borrowed Rs 9226.375 crore on an average per month during the 2020-21 financial year. Andhra Pradesh’s debt burden was Rs 97,000 crore at the time of bifurcation in June 2014. In five years (till March 2019), it peaked at Rs 2,58,928 crore.
The Jagan led Andhra Pradesh government in May whilst presenting its annual budget for the financial year 2021-22 in the midst of a raging second wave of the pandemic didn’t let its appeasement politics die down.
It allotted a whopping Rs 48,000 crore towards implementing 22 freebie schemes. Three of these schemes will cost Rs 16,899 crore and will be implemented through the State Development Corporation. After the freebie politics, the public debt is expected to mount to Rs 3,87,125 crore, rising from Rs 3,55,874 crore the previous year as the government targets to borrow Rs 50,525 crore afresh.
Jagan Mohan Reddy is spending the taxpayer’s money to give money to fellow Christians for religious tours. Also, he is giving monthly salaries to Christian pastors and Muslim Imams while rich Hindu temples like TTD are being robbed by the state government.
Jagan’s stupid decisions have led to massive public anger against him and his government. Over a hundred petitions challenging the government’s decision over three capitals have been filed before the Andhra Pradesh High Court.
Now Jagan feels there is a need to exhaustively explain to the people about the government’s intentions and also make amendments to plug the loopholes of the existing Bill. “The Act was being withdrawn in the larger public interest,” he said.
“Unfortunately, he was not able to spell out a clear stance on his plan for the state capital and the overall development of the state,” said Nara Lokesh, son of TDP leader Chandrababu Naidu.
The YSRCP government’s two and a half years has been the most disastrous in the history of Andhra Pradesh, and the state has to bear with him for another two and a half years before the citizens get a chance to vote him out.