AP capital by 2017

No approval of layouts in Krishna, Guntur

• Land acquisition through pooling system: Narayana
• Panel visited 3 capitals _ Gandhinagar, Chandigarh and Naya Raipur
• Ministers to visit Singapore, China

Hyderabad: Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu set himself a hard target to complete the development of the new capital at Vijayawada by the end of 2017. Beginning now, the land acquisition process would be completed in about six months to one year and the capital, along with social infrastructure which the Chief Minister was repeatedly insisting upon, would take another two years.

Disclosing the details of the tour of various capitals in the country by the specially constituted panel, Minister for Municipal Administration and Urban Development P Narayana said he and his team learnt the intricacies involved in the land acquisition and construction of various capitals. He said all these capitals, Chandigarh, Gandhinagar and Naya Raipur were built between 1960 and 2007 acquired the land through land pooling system and offered different packages to the owners. But all these capital cities did one mistake of not developing social infrastructure,’’ he said. He said Chandigarh acquired 5,000 acres, Gandhinagar 5,700 hectares and Naya Raipur 8,000 hectares. But Naya Raipur failed to build social infrastructure and as a result five lakh square feet built up area has been lying vacant. Only 5,000 people are now living in Naya Raipur which could accommodate 50,000 people. In addition to this, all the officials and the Chief Minister shuttle between Raipur and Naya Raipur covering a distance of 25 km every day. The Chattisgarh government is offering them double the DA and travelling expenses, yet the employees are living in Raipur since the capital city has no schools or hospitals,’’ Narayana said. He said the Andhra Pradesh government will not commit such mistakes. The Chief Minister is very particular about social infrastructure and wants that it is developed simultaneously along the capital. Regarding availability of land, he said the government was looking between 10,000 and 50,000 acres of land and if necessary acquire another 25,000 acres more at a later stage. Most of the land would be acquired from the farmers under the land pooling system. Asked whether the farmers were willing to part with their land, the minister said the collectors of Krishna and Guntur district interacted with 2,000 farmers, of them 80 per cent were willing to give their land. The policy of acquisition would be decided in a month’s time, the minister added.

He further said that the ministerial team will visit Singapore and China next month to study the finer aspects of the development of capital.