TDP president and former Andhra Pradesh CM N Chandrababu Naidu has been saying that Amaravati capital city is a self-financing project and the government won’t have to invest much to develop it, except for creating infrastructure.
But present chief minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy does not believe this argument. He says Naidu’s concept of making Amaravati city is a perverted thinking.
“Nowhere in the world has it been proved. Major cities grow over decades and centuries,” he pointed out in an interview to a national media on Wednesday.
He said investing Rs one lakh crore to build a mega metro is not viable.
“Forget about additional revenue, you cannot even repay the debt which you have spent on infrastructure,” Jagan said.
He clarified that it is a wrong perception that cities generate more money. Barring a couple of exceptions, green field capital cities did not succeed anywhere in the world. The success of one such city was built on oil money, which was abundantly available in that nation. Infrastructure was created as financial resources were available in plenty. They did not look at it from the economic angle.
“Do we have that many resources to build the so-called Amaravati?” he asked.
“Look at the top 10 developed countries. None of them have a metro and mega city. Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Switzerland and Finland…all these developed countries have no mega cities. Development is not industrialisation or urbanisation. Development means many a thing like per capita income and happiness index,” he said.
