The YS Jagan Mohan Reddy Government on Monday passed a Bill in the Andhra Pradesh Legislative Assembly, repealing the controversial AP Decentralisation and Inclusive Development of All Regions Act, 2020, which was intended to establish three capitals for the State.
Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy, however, told the Assembly that the Government would come up with a “complete, comprehensive and better” Bill to take forward his “decentralised development” plan after explaining “our genuine intention and the need for decentralisation” to all concerned and incorporating necessary changes.
The 2020 Act was being repealed to protect the larger interests of people, he claimed.
The Chief Minister did not utter the word Amaravati even once in his statement and only referred to it as “this region”.
“In the last one-and-a-half to two years since we came up with the idea of decentralised development (read establishing three capitals), it has been distorted, twisted in many ways, misgivings were created, legal tangle was created. In the last two years, a false propaganda was carried out by raising an argument that it (three capitals) will cause injustice to some section,” Jagan alleged.
He claimed that the previous Chandrababu Naidu government’s decision to establish the State capital “in this region” was controversial.
“It violated the Sri Krishna committee reported in all ways. Still, Chandrababu decided to build the capital here on 50,000 acres,” Jagan said.
Taking a defensive stance, Jagan said he had no antagonism towards “this region”. “I have a house here and I love this region,” he said.
The Chief Minister said at least `1 lakh crore was required to create even basic infrastructure like roads and electricity at the rate of `2 crore per acre.