“The capital cannot be moved even an inch now,” CM Chandrababu Naidu has asserted even as the Opposition YSRCP remains unyielding on the Amaravati plan
For the second time in under two years, Amaravati burst into celebrations last week as Parliament passed a legislation, followed by President Droupadi Murmu’ assent to it, to accord a 217 sq km expanse in Guntur district the statutory status of being Andhra Pradesh’s sole and permanent capital.
The first time was in June 2024 when the National Democratic Alliance (NDA), led by Telugu Desam Party (TDP) chief Chandrababu Naidu, rode to power in Andhra Pradesh, dislodging the Jagan Mohan Reddy government that had stalled Naidu’s dream capital project.
Amaravati is now perhaps India’s only state capital to have been specifically designated as such through an amendment to a law—the Andhra Pradesh Reorganisation Act of 2014.
The rejoicing in Amaravati on April 2 was only natural as its residents had, back in 2015 during Naidu’s previous chief ministerial term, parted with around 33,000 acres of fertile land abutting the Krishna river. Betting on Naidu’s grand new capital and the promise of good returns, the locals would eventually see the mega project practically discarded once Jagan Reddy assumed command in 2019.
Andhra Pradesh had long needed a new capital as its bifurcation in 2014 placed Hyderabad with the new state of Telangana. Although this growth propeller IT hub, as per the AP Reorganisation Act, was designated as the joint capital of the two states till 2024, Naidu sensed the need for Andhra to have its own capital at the earliest. As the first chief minister of the truncated Andhra, he selected the region between Vijayawada and Guntur cities as the location for capital Amaravati.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated the Amaravati project in October 2015 at Uddandarayunipalem, one of the 29 villages that gave up land in a pooling scheme. Construction was on track when the power shift after the 2019 polls stalled work. From architecture to infra, several firms, including the renowned Singapore Consortium, were disengaged by the Jagan Reddy government and even nearly-complete buildings were abandoned.
Jagan Reddy had opposed the choice of Amaravati and, alternatively, announced a decentralised and controversial three-capital structure for Andhra. Under this plan, the state executive was to be located in Visakhapatnam in northern Andhra and the judiciary at Kurnool in Rayalaseema. Amaravati was to just seat the legislature.
However, throughout Jagan Reddy’s five-year-long rule, Amaravati farmers and their families agitated against his three-capital move, which was anyway stuck because of legal challenges. Their 1,631 days-long protest ended on June 12, 2024—the day Naidu was sworn in as chief minister again.
Last year, Naidu brought the greenfield capital project back in the forefront, and Modi reinaugurated the works in May. Construction resumed and is progressing briskly to meet Naidu’s target of core infrastructure completion by 2028.
However, TDP leaders and locals are hounded by fears of the Yuvajana Sramika Rythu Congress Party’s resurgence and the consequential threat of Jagan Reddy raking up his aversion to Amaravati.
It is under these circumstances that the TDP, the BJP’s biggest ally in the NDA, pushed the Modi government to enshrine Amaravati capital status. On March 28, the Andhra Pradesh legislative assembly unanimously adopted a resolution requesting the central government to amend Section 5 of the AP Reorganisation Act to include the word “at Amaravati” and to add the words “and Amaravati includes the capital city areas notified under the AP Capital Region Development Authority Act 2014”.
Within days, the Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha passed the Andhra Pradesh Reorganisation (Amendment) Act, 2026 by voice vote, with the YSRCP being the only noticeable opposer.
“The capital cannot be moved even an inch from here now,” Naidu asserted, calling the passage of the Act a historic moment and thanking Modi and home minister Amit Shah for the legislation.
“Amaravati’s self-respect has triumphed. Today, the capital has received an irreversible legal status backed by Parliament,” Naidu said on April 2 as he, accompanied by wife Bhuvaneswari, visited Uddandarayunipalem, the foundation-stone site of Amaravati, attended a ‘deepa-harathi’ and prostrated at the heap of earth, collected from across the country, for the 2015 event.
“After facing numerous conspiracies, we have reclaimed our capital,” Naidu said as he lambasted the YSRCP.
But the Opposition party’s chief Jagan Reddy is apparently not relenting even now. While Naidu describes Amaravati as ‘praja-rajadhani’ (people’s capital), the former chief minister terms Amaravati as “the capital of corruption”.
Addressing the media, Jagan Reddy reiterated his stand that “Chandrababu had engineered unprecedented, impractical policies and chose Amaravati as the location in order to enrich himself and his coterie”. He wondered from where the Rs 2 lakh crore needed for the Amaravati project would be secured and how long it would take to complete the capital.
The YSRCP chief warned that Naidu was pushing Andhra into a debt trap to satisfy his self-worth. “When Chandrababu Naidu boasts that the capital city is a self-financed model, why were loans taken, allocations made in the Budget? It all pointedly speaks of the rampant corruption and layers of scams involved, from land acquisition to tendering process, and the exorbitant rates being given to favoured contractors,” Jagan Reddy alleged, stating that his priority instead was people’s welfare.
