50 days after HC verdict, work on pending Amaravati projects begins

Nearly 50 days after the state high court delivered the judgement upholding Amaravati as the only capital of the state, the Andhra Pradesh government on Saturday resumed works on some of the abandoned projects.

An official of the AP Capital Region Development Authority (APCRDA) said that the works on the completion of pending works in the MLA and MLC quarters and All India Service Officers’ residential towers at Rayapudi village had resumed and will be completed soon.

“The remaining works related to the residential quarters of the employees, gazetted officers and others will also commence soon,” the official said.

The construction companies have started laying tiles, water pipelines and electricity cables in the multi-storey buildings. “The work is likely to pick up pace from Monday,” the official said.

The state government had already intimated the high court (HC) that discussions were held with the financial institutions on March 23 to finance the pending the construction works and other infrastructure in Amaravati capital region.

The farmers of Amaravati welcomed the workers and engineers by giving them flowers.

“We are happy that the work has resumed, thanks to the high court’s intervention. We hope the government will also complete the works such as clearance of bushes and levelling of plots allotted to us soon and hand over the developed plots to us,” said Amaravati farmers’ joint action committee leader Saheb Jan Sheikh.

In its judgement on March 3, the HC pointed out that the previous government had spent nearly ₹15,000 crore on development activities and grounded works worth another ₹32,000 crore in Amaravati and the present government will account for the money spent on the constructions undertaken by the earlier government to the public.

The HC had said that the entire construction and development of Amaravati capital city will be completed within six months’ time. “The reconstituted plots belonging to land owners be developed with all the amenities and handed over to the land holders within three months,” the high court said.

However, on April 3, the state government submitted an affidavit in the HC that it is practically impossible to complete the entire project within six months due to limited financial resources and constraints.In the affidavit, chief secretary Sameer Sharma appealed to the high court to either remove the six-month deadline or extend the time limit by five years.

Stating that the value of various works given on contract were estimated to be around ₹ 42,231 crore, Sharma said most of these contracts were executed primarily in anticipation of loans from multilateral financial institutions and most of them did not fructify.

“The revival of these contracts would also entail resumption of negotiations with the financial institutions and also the possible central government grants for the same, the conclusion of which is a time-consuming process,” he added. The affidavit is yet to come up for hearing.