The case of Amaravati - The competitive city paradigm

The case of Amaravati The competitive city paradigm: new urban governance and the entrepreneurial city

07/01/2019 Mini-Essay Urban Economic Geography

-Divya Chand Master in Urban Studies, Cohort-2

Spread in the October’17 issue of ‘Amaravati Times’, a monthly-magazine initiated in September ‘17.

As the editor describes it: While much-hated hasty bifurcation left a bitter taste among the five crore Telugu people of residual Andhra Pradesh, the announcement of new capital Amaravati on the banks of holy River Krishna has evoked excitement and raised new hopes and aspirations. In line with their new found expectations, we have felt there is a dire need for a new English magazine that intended to inspire, enthuse, educate and enlighten masses amidst growing negative reporting that spoils the morning mood of readers. (Photograph by Author)

In June 2014, the state of Andhra Pradesh (AP) in India, split to form Telangana and a residual AP state. The erstwhile capital city of Hyderabad now located in Telangana was declared a joint capital for 10 years.

Andhra Pradesh, now left without a capital city, is supposed to develop one in the forthcoming decade. The Government of India appointed the ‘Sivaramakrishnan Committee’ to come up with alternatives. The committee’s recommendations included distribution of capital functions in the existing urban centers, least dislocation of prevailing agriculture systems and minimum resettlement of people. This was in line with the fact that the central region of AP, bisected by India’s Krishna River is known as the rice bowl of the country with a thriving rural economy that produces more than 100 varieties of crops each year. The committee did not consider one single large capital city as a feasible option, even explicitly mentioning that a large workforce dependent on agriculture would be rendered unemployed, valuable agricultural land would be lost and it would lead to the disappearance of smallholdings and farmers. The report mentioned that this would “benefit only land speculation and serge profit for the real estate operators”. (Ramachandraiah, 2016) 1 Contradictorily, the new AP government led by Chief minister Chandrababu Naidu, grabbed the opportunity of the bifurcated state with both hands and is intensely working to establish foundations of a new Andhra Pradesh, through a massive city building project. The demand for a new seat of power for the new government, something of spatial and symbolical significance, that captures and exemplifies #AndhraPride is at the heart of conceptualizing a new city. Amaravati literally means “abode of the gods.” As the APCRDA’s (Andhra Pradesh Capital Region Development) website puts it: Amaravati is envisioned as a unique, vibrant and beautiful city with no crowding, crime, pollution or homelessness, a hometown where young people, families and elders can thrive, a local economy that attracts talented people and global businesses, and a community where everyone contributes and shares in natural beauty and educational and economic opportunities. 2 Over the last four years, 217 square km of farmland has seen the slow transformation into a new ‘world-class city’. Within two decades, this area that housed just 13,000 people in 2011 aims to house more than 11 million. Contemporary India has only known large scale urban development in gated parcels in existing cities, the much-celebrated Smart-city project and development of Industrial townships. Amaravati is novel in that it aims to be a business-hub, with finance and service sectors driving the economy. Staggeringly expensive and already behind schedule, the city represents India’s biggest attempt at casting off a reputation for urban chaos and pollution and creating a grand, ultra-modern city to match its global ambitions. (Bengali, 2018) 3 With no elected municipal body at the urban scale yet, governance is spoken about by people involved as being as ‘greenfield’ as the city. With dissolution of the original regional development authority, the APCRDA, a new authority, runs all its functions afresh. Multiple agencies (with assistance from international consultancies) are intensively working on the planning and creation of the city. Excessive business-like negotiations have led to immense amount of investment that has kicked start the project. Apart from the government of India, foreign actors such as the Singapore government are major investors, and many private investors are constantly being sought. APCRDA also launched a special purpose vehicle under the Companies Act- Amaravati Development Corporation (ADC), that enables the large number of public-private partnerships underway. These are all top-down agencies that function like private firms.

But a city-building initiative like this does involve the participation and collaboration of thousands of people. In this context, this involved packaging intents and complexities into ideas that sell to the varied stakeholders, from international investors to local farmers to whom this area belonged. Gathering these large quantities of land involved people from 29 villages and all the surrounding areas. The land pooling scheme (LPS) used here is being celebrated as the most successful in India so far. LPS made the aggregation of so much area possible, with very less costs. The technique used was monetization of land, where in all owners are promised much smaller, but developed and serviced plots in the city once it is built, in exchange for their parcel, a quid pro quo kind of agreement. While the negotiated process seems more democratic than outright acquisition, land owners had no other option but to willingly or unwillingly comply, since otherwise their land would be

acquired through the Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, and they would lose the chance of owning a developed plot in the new city. It made all land owners in the selected area forced players in the speculative trade of land. Locals claimed that in 9 months, land prices shot up 3 times. The speculative nature of the LPS forces “even small and marginal farmers to become speculators—they had to make decisions about a future that they could hardly envision, much less control.” (Ramachandraiah, 2016). 1 A social activist called this a ‘share market in the fields’.

Despite this, the APCRDA has managed to strategically create a narrative of inclusion and participation quite well. To make the scheme work, the state has to create hype about the proposed capital, foster belief in a particular future, and induce landowners to envision different futures—a gamble that is based purely on faith that the government will fulfil its promises and that the market will yield the desired results.(Upadhya, 2017)4 Arduous strategic practices have gone into making this possible, as the idea of the city is different for different stakeholders, there is a multiplicity of intent and philosophies. The image and spectacle they have managed to create has been the crucial object for governance, as this is what is used to get on board with the project.

The image of visionary chief minister and chairman of the project Naidu combined with shiny aerial view renders and soaring land values seem to do the trick for many. A glance through the draft master plans, especially its careful projection of highly seductive computer-generated images (Surbana 2015b), unrealistic projections of job creation, and high population growth (despite declining demographic trends in this region) to make it a megacity, in the backdrop of a huge real estate speculation, suggests that Amaravati represents a class of speculative cities (Ramachandraiah 2016). 1 As a city that does not yet exist, the constructed discourse around Amaravati already compares into megacities like Mumbai and Bangalore. The fact that it is greenfield is used to claim that it won’t have the many issues of informality and inequality that most cities in India do. The 68-year-old chief minister, who cloaks his marketer’s zeal in simple, khaki-colored safari suits, touts his record in turning Hyderabad, 800, into an information-technology hub starting in the late 1990s. Companies such as Microsoft and Oracle set up shop in a high-tech enclave outside the city that Naidu dubbed “Cyberabad.” (Bengali, 2018) 3 As the narrative focusses on supply-side economics, there is blind faith in trickle down effects of getting big investors and international firms as a part of the city. The most iconic photos being circulated are those of the Govt. complex in center of the future city, design by London based architecture firm Foster and Partners.5 The extravagant renders are used not just to manage public opinion and manufacture consent, but also attract anchor investors to strategic locations in the city. The state claims that this will further increase land prices of the allotted plots around these plots, another move in the game of speculation. Many crores of rupees have already been spent on multiple master plans for the city that were rejected, by reputed architects from within India and across the world. There was also a stint where the director of a popular local fantasy movie Bahubali was asked to share his vision for the city. There is intense marketing and a monthly magazine, in English, mentioning everything from block-chain, hyperloop, electric cars, mythical temples, local cinema, and much more that asks people to adore the regions of a city yet to materialize: the city-branding exercise is unending. While underlying politics and economic agendas are the copiously discussed drivers of this city’s making, the cultural aspirations and collective memories of the people of Andhra act as the necessary impetus for the project. It is a reterritorialization of the region by a deterritorialized provincial elite through return flows of capital and state-led revitalization of regional identity.

While the Amaravati plan reflects broader trends of neoliberal urbanization in India, it is also deeply embedded in regional development aspirations and contestations. (Upadhya, 2017).4 Amaravati is a spectacular example of urban governance and planning being conducted in an entrepreneurial way, the state strategically navigating the market. The project is steeped in its Indian context and complexities but aspires to and imitates the competitive city paradigm of the Global North unabashedly.

REFERENCES: Ramachandraiah, C (2016). Making of Amaravati-A Landscape of Speculation and Intimidation. Economic and political weekly. 51. 68-75. https://www.epw.in/journal/2016/17/special-articles/making-amaravati.html 1

APCRDA Investment Promotion. (n.d.). Retrieved January 5, 2019, from https://www.amaravati.gov.in/eBRICKS/UserInterface/html/InvestmentPromotionsvr.aspx 2

Bengali, S. (2018, December 18). India tries to build a world-class city from scratch, and looks to Singapore for help. Retrieved December 31, 2018, from https://www.latimes.com/world/asia/la-fg-india-singaporeamaravati-20181218-story.html?fbclid=IwAR3HvG-q8QOqYopuUtfsnfUfcAKVm1ziKQTWZrJiisJWqcLOD86YXmzYdU 3

Upadhya, C. (2017). Amaravati and the New Andhra: Reterritorialization of a Region. Journal of South Asian Development, 12(2), 177–202. https://doi.org/10.1177/0973174117712324 4

Stouhi, D. (2018, May 16). First Images Released of Foster Partners Designs for Amaravati, the New Capital of Andhra Pradesh. Retrieved January 6, 2019, from https://www.archdaily.com/894517/amaravtidevelopment-is-one-step-closer-as-norman-foster-oversees-its-progress?ad_medium=gallery 5

Note- All unreferenced information is from author’s notes taken during an exposure trip to the site of Amaravati in January 2018. Many stakeholders from within the state and beyond shared information and opinions.