For his own reasons, YSR Congress party president and Andhra Pradesh chief minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy has taken a decision to shift the administrative capital to Visakhapatnam and he is defending the same by all means.
The most important reason is decentralisation of administration for all-round development of the state and secondly, there is virtually no money with the government to go ahead with the capital construction at Amaravati.
The decision has naturally caused a lot of unrest among the farmers of Amaravati, who had given away their lands for the capital city, but the previous TDP government led by N Chandrababu Naidu had hardly done anything to give a shape to the capital.
In a way, it was Naidu who had created an illusionary picture about a mega capital at Amaravati and is responsible for the shattering of their dreams at present.
Since it is a sensitive issue, Jagan Mohan Reddy is trying to deal with Amaravati farmers’ issue cautiously so that his decision would not backfire on him politically.
He is said to be working out a comprehensive plan for development of Amaravati that would satisfy the farmers.
However, some of his cabinet colleagues like Botsa Satyanarayana and Peddireddi Ramachandra Reddy, and YSR Congress leaders like Karem Sivaji and Alla Ramakrishna Reddy are making nasty statements that are only adding fuel to the fire.
Participating in a face-to-face programme of a television channel, Alla Ramakrishna Reddy made some strong comments against agitating farmers, that went viral in the social media, triggering further anger among the farmers.
He said what the farmers of Amaravati had done was “trading” with the government and not a sacrifice.
“If I have one acre of land and I give it to the government free of cost, then you can call it a sacrifice. But the farmers are of Amaravati had not given the land free of cost for the capital,” he said.
Alla pointed out that for every one acre, the farmer got back 20 per cent of the land in the form of plots with the hope that the plots would go up steeply and they would make crores of rupees from their plots.
“How can this be called a sacrifice? It was just a business deal,” he said.
He said as per the agreement, the government would develop the plots and give them to farmers.
“It is the government’s responsibility to see that the plots rates will go up,” the MLA said.
Karem Sivaji also made the same comments.
“It was the tribals and common people of Polavaram submergence villages who had done the real sacrifice. The Amaravati farmers are nothing before them,” he commented.
Such comments would only damage the image of the Jagan government which is trying to sort out the issue in an amicable way, an analyst observed.