The capital city issue for Andhra Pradesh has come back to square one with the indication of the present government to locate an executive capital at Vizag, while relocating the high court to Kurnool and discharge legislative functions both from Vizag as well as Amaravati. The GN Rao Committee, which gave its recommendations to the government, suggested setting up of regional commissionerates like in Karnataka in addition to distributing capital functions.
The coastal region and the Rayalaseema region were once part of the Madras Presidency along with the Tamilians and other linguistic groups. We were more or less equal to Tamilians in terms of numbers in the then city of Madras. Andhras had an equal right over Madras as much as Tamilians had. But then Congress politics and the stature that C Rajagopalachari commanded within the Congress ensured that Madras stayed back with the then Madras state. In fact, Potti Sreeramulu’s hunger strike was for an Andhra state with Madras. Though we got the state, we lost Madras and we had to look for a capital city. In terms of theoretical background for setting up of a capital city, there are three important theories which knowingly or unknowingly play an important role with a positive perspective. Forward Thrust theory envisages setting up of the capital in a backward area when forward and backward areas come together to form a state or a country. This is a concession given by the forward area to the backward area to facilitate its faster development. It was this that was in the mind of Prakasam Pantulu when he opted to set up the capital city in the more backward Rayalaseema in 1953.
Honouring the commitments given under the Sribagh Pact, the high court was located at Guntur. The other theory is one of Spacial Compromise wherein two regions come together and after discussion and negotiations, agree to locate the capital city in a neutral area like it happened in the USA with reference to Washington DC, and in Australia, by locating the capital city at Canberra. One more theory is the theory of Strategic Location where the capital city is located keeping in view the strategic interests of the state or the country concerned. Whereas the above represent positive theories for the location of the capital city, sometimes, capital cities also get located based on considerations of ethnicity, real estate interests and with a hidden agenda. Such capitals are exclusive in nature and are short-lived and fragile.
Their growth and existence get linked to the person or the dynasty which promotes them. Unfortunately, when Andhra Pradesh got divided from Telangana in 2014, none of the above positive theoretical principles were followed while locating the new capital city. It was neither located in the backward area to fall within the principle of Forward Thrust theory, nor was site selection result of a discussion and consensus as envisaged under the Spacial Compromise theory. If the strategic interests of the state were to dictate the location of the capital city, there were better places like Vizag. Ignoring all this, the capital city was located after obtaining the approval of the Assembly in a strategically manipulative manner at Amaravati. The decision was unilateral and had a hidden agenda. People of other regions were not taken into confidence.
The historical context was also totally ignored and no offer was made to locate the high court in Rayalaseema as agreed to between gentlemen of both the regions in the Sribagh Pact even before independence. The location of a capital got subsumed into an effort to build a greenfield city involving the farmers also as stakeholders promising to them an El Dorado. The manner in which the capital city was located at Amaravati unilaterally not as an inclusive capital city but as an exclusive disembedded capital city is at the root of the present day efforts to relocate it to achieve regional balance and also decentralised development. Involvement of farmers as stakeholders in the capital city now complicates any decision of relocation. There is an urgent need to discuss the issue and build up a broader consensus on the location of the capital city. One more unilateral decision will only keep the issue alive for the future as well.
IYR KRISHNA RAO
former chief secretary