AP Bifurcation: Divided opinion on new capital city

So far, five locations have been demanded as the new capital by leaders of the respective sub-regions in Seemandhra

The issue of new capital city for the residual Andhra Pradesh state is fast becoming a major bone of contention with leaders and organisations coming up with competing demands ahead of the ensuing elections.

So far, five locations — Vijayawada-Guntur, Visakhapatnam, Ongole (Prakasam district), Kurnool (Kurnool district) and Tirupati — have been demanded as the new capital by leaders of the respective sub-regions in Seemandhra.

Triggering a widespread debate on the question of which would be the most suitable place, a section of the local media also began filing reports and conducting SMS polls on the future choice.

In the Rayalaseema region, young people have already taken to the streets, though in small numbers, in support of their demand for Kurnool, which was the state capital for a brief period before Andhra and Telangana were merged to become a Telugu linguistic state in 1956.

For them the present bifurcation is nothing but a de-merger of the two regions, which had a separate existence prior to the formation of Andhra Pradesh state. Kurnool was made the capital of Andhra state, which was formed in 1953. The selection of Kurnool was the outcome of a gentlemen agreement called ‘Sribagh Pact’ signed between the leaders of coastal Andhra and Rayalaseema in the late 1930s.

While state minister TG Venkatesh, who hails from Kurnool district, was quick to echo the local sentiments, Union Minister of State for Railways Kotla Surya Prakash Reddy, also hailing from the same district, joined the bandwagon by demanding Kurnool as the state capital.

JC Diwaker Reddy, yet another Rayalaseema leader from the Congress, asked the youth not to resort to agitations for the sake of state capital as, according to him, the present leadership in Delhi would not listen to such voices.

A vernacular television channel on Sunday flashed the results of a phone call survey  conducted on the question of state capital. According to these polls,  66.71 per cent of the 66,024 callers favoured Vijayawada-Guntur as the ideal place for the future capital city. Visakhapatnam stood as the next best choice but was preferred by only 15.25 per cent of the total callers. Whereas  Ongole and Kurnool got just 13.69 per cent and 3.85 per cent votes respectively.  

In contrast, Eenadu, the largest circulated Telugu daily, ran a report on Monday on the same topic citing similar experiences and views of some senior bureaucrats, who preferred an all-new place over any existing city to build the state capital. The report, which received the highest number of hits (55,949 hits) on the newspaper’s web edition suggested Donakonda area in Ongole district as one of the ideal locations as it has 54,000 acres of government land readily available for building a state capital besides being half way distance from coastal Andhra and Rayalaseema regions.

Congress MP Magunta Srinivasulu Reddy, who represent the Ongole Lok Sabha seat, on Monday said he had written a letter to the Prime Minister seeking Ongole as the state capital.

Not falling behind their counterparts in other regions Union Minister V Kishore Chandra Dev, who hails from the north coastal district of Vizianagaram, wants Visakhapatnam as the new state capital, a view shared by several political leaders belonging to this region.

Some leaders suggest a compromise solution as deciding the location for the new state capital is also linked to certain complex socio political issues besides the lobbying power of the respective groups of the competing regions.  

A few from the Congress, including Pradesh Congress Committee (PCC) president Botcha Satyanarayana, and others like Jayaprakash Narayan of the Lok Satta Party have suggested that the state capital rather be decentralised by locating each set of offices and institutions at different cities in the Seemandhra region.  

The issue would have become a big political issue by now had the UPA government gone ahead with an earlier proposal of the Group of Ministers that the new capital would be decided within 45 days from date of the Gazette notification on the formation of Telangana state. The government, however, has declared that the decision on the new state capital would be announced in three months after the elections for Lok Sabha and the state Assembly are over.