The decision of the State government to repeal the three capitals law should have no bearing on the proposed establishment of the Andhra Pradesh High Court in Kurnool as the two issues are mutually exclusive, said Bojja Dasaratharami Reddy, president of the Rayalaseema Saguneeti Sadhana Samithi, on Monday.
“Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy, who spoke extensively in the Assembly on the need to honour the Sribagh Agreement, must go to Delhi and secure a presidential order in order to have the Andhra Pradesh High Court established in Kurnool as it has no link to the Andhra Pradesh Decentralization and Inclusive Development of All Regions Act and the Andhra Pradesh Capital Region Development Authority Repeal Act,” Mr. Dasaratharami Reddy said.
While the CRDA Act was passed in July 2016, the presidential notification for the setting up of the High Court was given on January 1, 2019 and the High Court Chief Justice had pointed out during a recent hearing of a three capitals case that setting up of the High Court was not linked to that case, Mr. Dasaratharami Reddy said, and asked the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to honour its Kurnool Declaration and work with the YSRCP to secure the presidential order.
While welcoming the Chief Minister’s vision to develop all regions in the State on an equal footing, the RSSS president said that the Chief Minister must immediately write to the Centre on the setting up of the Krishna River Management Board Office in Kurnool instead of Visakhapatnam, which can be done without any link to the laws repealed now.
The third and the most important thing is to get all the ongoing projects on the Krishna — such as the Galeru Nagari, Telugu Ganga, Velugodu, Mutchimarri Lift, Siddhapuram, and the Gundurevula Project — notified as approved projects by submitting the DPRs within six months, as the notification issued by the Jal Shakti Ministry makes them unauthorised if water was not allocated and projects not approved, he pointed out.
For this too, the YSRCP government must work in tandem with the BJP leaders in the State to get legitimacy for the projects, failing which Telangana Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao, who is already objecting to water allocation for these projects, would get an upper hand in the courts to have these projects stopped, Mr. Dasaratharami Reddy observed.