By Desaraju Surya
AMARAVATI: By design or by default, the Chandrababu Naidu government in Andhra Pradesh seems to be driving the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (Nabard) out of Amaravati.
Land allotted to these two national institutions in the upcoming capital city has been drastically cut throwing their plans to establish regional centres in Amaravati haywire.
The suo moto decision by the government, which virtually relies on the mercy of the Reserve Bank of India to make its ends meet, has left not only the banking circles but also those in the Government of India baffled, to say the least.
Making matters worse, a top executive of the RBI was allegedly ill-treated by the AP Capital Region Development Authority Commissioner when the former came with a request to re-consider the decision on land allotment.
Even Nabard authorities met with a cold response from the CRDA officials, authoritative sources said.
All this could, in fact, have a detrimental effect on other such prime projects, especially those related to the Government of India, thereby upsetting the Amaravati development plans.
According to authoritative sources, Government of India institutions and organisations have not yet cleared their projects in Amaravati given the uncertainty over land allocation.
That was the reason why Prime Minister Narendra Modi did not launch a single project of the Government of India when he re-started the Amaravati works here on May 2.
During his previous tenure between 2014 and 2019, Chandrababu Naidu rolled out a red carpet to institutions like the RBI, noting that “Amaravati can be an attractive location for banks, especially PSBs, to set up regional corporate offices, training centres or central processing centres.”
Accordingly, the RBI was allotted 11 acres of land in the year 2016 on a 99-year lease basis. While five acres of the total land was supposed to be used for RBI’s regional office, the remaining six was earmarked for residential quarters for its staff.
RBI’s initial plan was to spend Rs 160 crore on infrastructure development, sufficient to meet the needs of its 450 officers and employees.
The RBI came forward to build an iconic structure aligning with Amaravati’s world-class theme.
At the same time, Nabard was allotted 4.3 acres for its AP region office and staff quarters. Nabard earmarked a budget of Rs 200 crore for its buildings, with a staff strength of 200.
The capital city project remained shelved from 2019 to 2024 during the YS Jagan Mohan Reddy regime but saw a revival in mid-2024 after Chandrababu returned to power.
But, suddenly in March 2025, the state government took a unilateral decision cutting down RBI’s land allotment by nine acres and Nabard’s by 3.3 acres, leaving the two national institutions that had well-laid plans for AP, aghast.
No reason was assigned by the Group of Ministers, which was entrusted with the task of land allotments in Amaravati, for slashing the allocation to RBI and Nabard to two and one acre respectively.
RBI is no ordinary entity and its regional office includes a high-security chest that requires specified space.
The two acres the CRDA now decided to give would no way be sufficient for RBI’s specific requirements.
This pushes the project into jeopardy.
Though not to RBI’s extent, curtailment in allotted land adversely affects Nabard’s needs as well.
Both RBI and Nabard have submitted fresh requests to the state government seeking restoration of the original land allotment in tune with their requirements.
But the government, in the last couple of months, has not taken any decision.
RBI and Nabard are not alone.
Even the Department of Posts is also at the receiving end as its land allocation has been reduced from 5.5 acres to just one.
For Bharat Petroleum Corporation Limited, 1.55 acres was allotted in 2017 but it has now been cut down to 0.4 acres.
Same for Union Bank of India – the lead bank of Andhra Pradesh – and Syndicate Bank, Bank of India and Indian Bank.
Ironically, in its economic development plan, the state government identified banking, financial services and insurance as a ‘key vertical’ that could be an important segment for Amaravati city.
If at all, it would now begin with at least (-minus) 1000 jobs.
A bad sign, indeed!