Vijayawada-Guntur: Frontrunner as Seemandhra Capital

CommonFloor in an article titled Seemandhra Capital Race: The top five contenders, published on Mar 4, 2014 had zeroed on five cities that had the potential to wear the crown of the capital city for the new state. Though there were five options, due to a myriad factors, Vijayawada-Guntur stretch had clocked the first position on our list.

And interestingly, while addressing the media fraternity, Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu gave an inkling of building the new capital of the state between Vijayawada and Guntur.

As bifurcation dust settled, with several political calculations, India’s newest state was born on 2nd June, 2014. With everything nearing stability, all the eyes are now set on the new capital for Seemandhra.

Why Vijayawada-Guntur belt?

Due to its central location on Andhra’s map, the 25 km stretch of Vijayawada-Guntur evolved as a potential option for this coveted spot. As Vijayawada is famous for its automobile industry and Guntur rides a piggy back on its cotton, chillies and tobacco trade, the belt can be developed as a manufacturing and trading hub of the region.

The town of Mangalagiri also falls on this stretch, which again is a developed city. It boasts of several education institutions such as Acharya Nagarjuna University and NRI Medical College and Academy of Science. This city is also one of the major centres for hand-woven fabric, which forms the major part of their economy.

In addition to being centrally-located, Vijayawada-Guntur belt is a potential option because it is well-developed as compared to the other contenders. Thus, it would require less time and finance to develop this stretch as capital. Another factor that works in favour of this belt is its proximity to Krishna river, which will cater the water needs of the capital city.

In addition, through one of the largest railway stations in the country, Vijayawada enjoys excellent intra-city connectivity. It is worth mentioning here that as per the report by McKinsey, Vijayawada has been recognised as a Global City with the year 2025 as the growth horizon.

Also, Naidu is of the opinion that the new capital should have robust social infrastructure and all kinds of facilities including social, education, entertainment and shopping, and not only government buildings that are usually dead by evening.

Is there any problem?

However, land acquisition would be a herculean task here. As per the Land Acquisition Bill, the land can only be acquired on the basis of the prevailing market value. Thus. arranging finance in a short span of time would be very difficult. Since the land has to be acquired through farmers, there are chances of farmer protests like those in Noida. Also, the property values have already touched sky.

Therefore, Naidu is working to come up with an interesting policy for acquiring land, where farmers will pool in as partners and will also get the rights over 35-40 per cent developed land. The details on the same are yet to be out in public domain. The move will be significantly benefit the farmers as they can garner healthy returns from the developed land. It will also help the state government, which currently is struggling for funds.

Talks of developing Vijayawada and Guntur as the twin cities on the similar lines of Hyderabad-Secunderabad are also doing the rounds.