There is no statutory provision disallowing the state government from having more than one capital, the Ministry of Home Affairs has declared before the Andhra Pradesh High Court.
The central government has also asserted that it has no role in deciding the location of the capital of a state.
“Under Article 3 of the Constitution of India, there is provision only for creation of new states and other related matters. No provision in respect of capital is laid down.”
The submissions come as a shot in the arm for the Jaganmohan Reddy government faced with a legal hurdle in the form of a bunch of petitions challenging the move to have three capitals for Andhra Pradesh.
One of the petitioners Done Sambasiva Rao had contended that the Andhra Pradesh Reorganization Act 2014 (APRA) had mandated a single capital city for the state.
The union government was made a respondent in the matter.
In an affidavit submitted before the Andhra Pradesh High Court, the MHA officials made it clear that “Section 13 of The General Clauses Act, 1897 states that in all central acts and regulations, unless there is anything repugnant in the subject or context, words in the singular shall include the plural and vice versa”
“Thus, it is made amply clear that the interpretation of the petitioner on the above issue is shallow.”
The central ministry also detailed that the “Notification of President’s order regarding constitution of a separate High Court for AP with principal seat at Amaravati by the central government cannot be construed as the central government’s decision to declare Amaravati as capital of AP, as the principal seat of high court need not necessarily be in the capital city of the state.”
The MHA further said that the APRA provisions, “only talks about providing financial assistance by the central government for the new capital as chosen by the state of Andhra Pradesh and not for deciding a capital for the state by the central government.”
While Hyderabad was allotted as the joint capital of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana till 2014, the previous TDP regime under Chandrababu Naidu had chosen Amaravati as the capital, notifying it in April 2015. Survey of India had also incorporated Amaravati, in Guntur district, as the Andhra’s capital in the political maps of India.
Since 2017, the Andhra government has been functioning from an interim secretariat complex at Amaravati, where a legislative complex and a high court were also built.
However, the YSRCP government had brought in legislations earlier this year stripping the Amaravati region of sole capital status and setting up three capitals– the executive at Visakhapatnam, legislative capital at Amaravati and judiciary at Kurnool.
The AP high court hearing about 70 petitions from local farmers, NGOs, and public representatives challenging the implementation of the two legislations has issued status quo orders barring any move on the capital shift till 21 September.