With Andhra Pradesh looking to expand the Amaravati capital project with additional infrastructure, including an international airport, state minister P Narayana said Tuesday the government was again inclined towards voluntary land pooling rather than acquisition in the interest of farmers.
“Landowners and farmers are also keen on pooling land to the government rather than acquisition by the government. The local MLAs have conveyed the wishes of the farmers and landowners to the CM,’’ the minister for Municipal Administration and Urban Development told reporters after reviewing the availability of gravel and sand for the project at quarries near Ananthavaram.
Narayana said Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu, who has revived the project after returning to power last June, has suggested creating a megacity adjoining Amaravati by merging Mangalagiri and Tadepalli mandals of Guntur district and the Guntur city area with Vijayawada city. Keeping this in mind, he said, an international-level airport will be built, requiring about 5,000 acres.
“If there’s land acquisition, then we need only 5,000 acres for the airport, but farmers will be at a loss… As per Land Acquisition Act, they can get only two-and-a-half times of the registration price. On the other hand, land pooling will benefit farmers immensely in the form of returnable plots…”
“If we go for land pooling, then we will need to take 30,000-40,000 acres because after returning the developed plots and their share to the farmers, the government will be left with 5,000 acres or so. A few thousand acres will be required for roads, drainages, and other basic facilities,’’ he said.
The land will be in addition to the 34,241 acres pooled by 29,881 farmers in 29 villages of Guntur district during Naidu’s earlier stint as CM from 2014 to 2019.
Narayana said on CM Naidu’s directions, CRDA (Capital Region Development Authority) officials have already started a study on the megacity masterplan. However, he said, the government has not yet decided if it will go for acquisition of the land pooling option.
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After the TDP lost power in 2019, the Amaravati project had been scrapped by the YSRCP government, which instead proposed a “three capital formula” for “decentralised governance” — Amaravati as legislative capital, Visakhapatnam as administrative capital, and Kurnool as judicial capital.
On the delay in resuming construction since last year, Narayana said: “Since the tenders of that time (Naidu’s previous term) were not cancelled, all of them had to be resolved to avoid legal problems.. it took 8 months for that. Work has now started in the capital. Tenders for a total of 68 works worth Rs 42,360 crore have been completed. All these works have already started.”
Meanwhile, dismissing reports that some farmers who had pooled land in 2015 had yet to be handed the developed plots, he said the development of plot layouts will begin within a year. “Residential buildings for all the officials including All India Service officers will be completed in a year, within two years, 360 km of roads will be completed, and in the third year the iconic towers of Legislative and Secretariat will be completed,” he added.
