EXPLAINED
The story so far: On Monday, Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy inaugurated 13 new districts, pointing out that the main objective was to take the administration to the people’s doorsteps. During his 2019 election campaign, Mr. Reddy had promised that if elected to power, his government would create new districts based on parliamentary constituencies in the State. The total number of districts has gone up to 26; and Andhra Pradesh has 25 Lok Sabha constituencies. Districts were last reorganised in the 1970s, when Prakasam and Vizianagaram came into existence in the unified State of Andhra Pradesh, which was formed in 1956.
Why has the government set up new districts?
During the election campaign, Mr. Jagan Mohan Reddy promised to create new districts in order to take the administration to the grassroot level. The government had received over 17,500 representations from the people and decided on the new districts by taking their demands into account. The primary objective, according to the Chief Minister, is to take a substantial leap in efforts to achieve Sustainable Development Goals. He said the performance of collectors would be assessed on the basis of steps taken by them to achieve the goals. The new districts are Parvathipuram Manyam, Alluri Sitharama Raju, Anakapalli, Kakinada, Konaseema, Eluru, NTR, Palnadu, Bapatla, Nandyal, Annamayya, Tirupati and Sri Satya Sai.
Collectors and SPs in all the new districts assumed charge on Monday and the distribution of staff is almost completed.
Who will the new districts serve?
As far as the new districts are concerned, Mr. Jagan Mohan Reddy claimed that the distance from the remote and border villages to the district headquarters has been reduced. Each of the 26 districts now has six to eight Assembly constituencies — Andhra has 175 Assembly seats.
His assertion is that the new districts will be manageable, unlike the old ones, with an average population of 19.07 lakh each compared to the average of 38.15 lakh as per the 2011 Census. He drew a comparison with Telangana among other States, saying it has 33 districts for a population of nearly 3.85 crore. The Chief Minister said with a population of 4.90 crore as per the 2011 Census, Andhra required more districts.
As a prelude to the formation of new districts, the government had established ward and village secretariats in October 2019 and on Monday, apart from the 13 new districts, 21 additional revenue divisions have been formed, taking their total number to 72.
Each district is coterminous with a Lok Sabha constituency. The Araku-ST constituency is the lone exception with two districts namely Alluri Sitharama Raju and Parvathipuram Manyam, keeping the needs of the vast tribal population in mind.
How will the new district administration function?
On the infrastructure front, transit accommodation has been provided to collectors and Superintendents of Police (SPs) and efforts are underway to build integrated administrative complexes on 15 acres in each one of the new districts. The idea is to have all offices i.e. offices of the collectors, SPs and heads of the district departments in one place to ensure that the people do not face any inconvenience.
The final designs of the office complexes will be ready by the end of April, by which time tenders for their construction will be invited.
What happened to the ‘three capitals’ plan?
The Chief Minister had also proposed ‘three capitals’ as a decentralisation move a few months after his party swept to power. But after facing massive protests, the government scrapped the AP Decentralisation and Inclusive Development of All Regions Act, 2020, and AP Capital Region Development Authority Repeal Act, 2020, for the development of three capitals — Amaravati (legislative), Visakhapatnam (executive) and Kurnool (judicial). Mr. Jagan Mohan Reddy has promised to introduce a more comprehensive Bill.
