The proposal for shifting of administrative capital from Amaravati to Viskhapatnam, which has been hanging in balance for over six months due to legislative and legal hurdles, is most likely to materialise in the last week of October, according to reports doing rounds in a section of media.
It was in December last year that YSR Congress party president and Andhra Pradesh chief minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy announced the decentralisation of administration by creating three capital cities for the state – executive capital at Visakhapatnam, legislative capital at Amaravati and judicial capital at Kurnool.
It was on January 21 that the state assembly first passed the bills for the three capitals, but they hit the roadblock in the state legislative council.
The bill was later referred to the select committee which was never formed. Meanwhile, the issue has been dragged to the state high court.
Ten days ago, the bills for three capitals and repeal of APCRDA were passed for a second time, but once again they were held up in the legislative council.
Now, the government is of the view that the bills would be deemed to be passed if there was no response from the council by first week of July.
The media reports say this would clear the hurdles for the shifting of the capital. However, since the state is suffering from Coronavirus pandemic, the chief minister is learnt to have asked the authorities to make preparations for the capital shift slowly.
In all probability, the chief minister’s office, residence and part of the Secretariat will move to Viskhapatnam by Vijaya Dasami or Dasara, which falls on October 25. This is final, unless something unusual happens creating further hurdles, the reports said.