In a sensational decision, the YSR Congress party government in Andhra Pradesh led by chief minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy on Monday decided to withdraw its decision to form three capital cities for the state.
The state cabinet which met at the state secretariat in the morning approved the decision to repeal the two acts – Andhra Pradesh Capital Region Development (Repeal) Act and AP Decentralisation and Inclusive Development of All Regions Act
The first act was aimed at abolishing the authority created by the previous TDP government in 2015 to develop Amaravati as the state capital and the second one was aimed at establishing three capitals for the state – executive capital at Visakhapatnam, judicial capital at Kurnool and legislative capital at Amaravati.
Both the acts were passed by the state assembly in June 2020, after a lot of resistance from the TDP. The chief minister would make a detailed statement in the assembly shortly.
Simultaneously, state advocate general Subrahmanyam Sriram informed the state high court that the two Acts are going to be repealed.
A division bench of the high court comprising chief justice Prashant Kumar Mishra and justices M Satyanaryana Murthy and D V S S Somayajulu, has been hearing a batch of petitions against the Jagan government’s decision to form three capitals, since November 15.
Thousands of farmers who gave up over 34,000 acres of their fertile lands for setting up the state capital in Amaravati, challenged these two laws in the high court. More than 100 petitions were filed by the farmers in this regard.
