The ruling of the Andhra Pradesh High Court that the AP Legislature lacked the authority to alter the previous government's Amaravati Capital plan, for which several agreements had been executed between the people and government agencies, comes as a great relief to the farmers who pooled their valuable lands and handed them over to the government for their dream capital.
The order called for the completion of all development activities promised in the slew of agreements with the people within six months, so that the Capital city may stand tall and proud in its allotted space. According to the High Court, it was a conflict between the poor and the mighty – a reenactment of David and Goliath – and the poor had no means to fight. All that the farmers could do was to go on a Gandhian way of protest demonstrations. Here was a government that promised a capital and asked for the people's cooperation. Thousands of acres of land were donated in the hope that the dream of a new capital for the remaining state of Andhra Pradesh would come true.
A new government took control and scrapped the plans, instead announcing three capitals. This resulted in a lengthy legal battle that took several turns and twists. The judiciary was singled out for criticism for this and other reasons. A petitioner accused the judges of securing "pecuniary benefits" and requested them to rescue themselves from the case.
A judge of the Apex Court (the present CJ) was also dragged into the muck, along with other HC judges, and a culture of debasement develops. The Amaravati Capital issue is essentially a political fight between the current and previous governments.
The present government entertained apprehensions over the genuinity of the land pooling effort of the previous government and suspected that the previous leaders resorted to insider trading.
The issue quickly escalated into a massive political and legal conflict, resulting in the neglect of the Capital region. All development work came to a standstill, and the entire region quickly resembled a bombed Syrian city. The territory has been called the "Land of Greed" by the region's current authorities. All they accomplished was to transform it into a realm of the damned. When the residents objected, they were labeled as TDP employees and sympathizers.
All of this resulted in a protracted legal battle in which the petitioners vigorously contested the power of the Andhra Pradesh State Legislature to make any statute trifurcating or bifurcating the capital or shifting the capital from Amaravati to any other location. Since the petitioners questioned the State Legislature's legislative competence, the court was also compelled to rule on the issue.
Meanwhile, the government ordered the CRDA's withdrawal, only to return to the status quo. Finally, the High Court decided against the 'politics' and declared that the petitioners' rights were inalienable as they were all agreements under the law.
And no government had the authority to overturn what the preceding administration had accomplished through a legislative and administrative procedure.
Of course, none of this means that litigation is over. The State administration would shortly challenge the order to the Supreme Court, and the quest for justice would begin all over again. So far, just one battle has been won, but the war remains.
