Let’s Have Three Capital Cities Instead of One, Indian State Decides

Andhra Pradesh, a southern state in India, may become a model for equal growth: the state is proposing to have three capitals instead of one, in a drive to help the nation better tackle its overcrowded cities.

India currently boasts five megacities – with the population in each city exceeding 10 million – which all suffer from traffic, pollution, lack of public transportation and affordable housing.

“Indian states focus on putting all their capital into just one big city instead of giving a boost to decentralized development, where more cities are adequately empowered and sustained to allow for balanced development,” explains Bhanu Joshi, a political scientist and ex-member of a committee that studied the three-capital plan, to the Thomson Reuters Foundation. “Andhra Pradesh is endowed with different types of natural resources – a policy of balanced regional development is the only way forward.”

Upon studying the feasibility of a multi-capital state, the government Andhra Pradesh passed a bill that allows for a legislative capital, an executive capital and a judicial capital, rather than building a new capital city. Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy highlights the importance of this move, saying, “We do not want to develop one area utilizing all our available financial resources while other areas suffer due to lack of funds.”