Hyderabad: Over a decade after bifurcation of Andhra Pradesh and the state’s administrative set-up shifting to Amaravati in 2016 under his command, Chief Minister Nara Chandrababu Naidu is finally going to have a home of his own in the area being developed as the state’s sole capital. Naidu was often derided by the opposition YSRCP for not possessing his own living space in Amaravati. The TDP chief was termed a visitor.
On Wednesday, Naidu, along with his wife Nara Bhuvaneswari, and grandson Devansh, performed the bhoomi-pooja, a Hindu initiation ritual for house construction. Naidu’s son and state minister Nara Lokesh and his wife Brahmani also took part in the ceremony held at their plot near the state secretariat at Velagapudi village in Amaravati capital area.
Following the TDP-led NDA’s spectacular victory in the state assembly polls last year, Naidu bought five acres of land from few Velagapudi locals in December.
The construction is expected to take a year, after which Naidu will shift into the house.
The ground-breaking ceremony took place just ahead of recommencement of capital project works in Amaravati, shelved by former CM Jagan Mohan Reddy in 2019.
Naidu’s greenfield, world class capital project of Rs 1 lakh crore is expected to be flagged-off by Prime Minister Narendra Modi once more, in the third week of April, in another grand ceremony. The first foundation stone for Amaravati was laid by Modi in October 2015, in his first term as PM. A year earlier, Naidu had been elected as the first CM of Andhra Pradesh following the reorganisation that led to the creation of Telangana.
Also Read: How Jagan is putting Andhra’s development in ‘jeopardy’ due to his obsession with Naidu
Naidu’s temporary arrangement
Though Hyderabad was designated as the joint capital for the two Telugu-speaking states for 10 years, till mid-2024, Naidu shifted the state executive seat abruptly to Amaravati in 2016. The move came amid a showdown with his counterpart-cum-political opponent K. Chandrashekar Rao over a slew of issues, including the 2015 Telangana MLC polls cash-for-votes scam probed by the Telangana Police.
As various departments were hurriedly adjusted in available government or private buildings on rent in and around Vijayawada, the Andhra Pradesh secretariat was moved into the present Velagapudi secretariat, built to serve as a temporary setup.
Naidu at that time unveiled his grand Amaravati blueprint, including the permanent, iconic secretariat towers, designed by globally renowned architects.
In 2015, Naidu himself moved into a large guesthouse leased from businessman Lingamaneni Ramesh, said to be close to the TDP. The Andhra Pradesh CM continues to reside, manages party affairs and conduct some government duties too from the bungalow, at Undavalli village, along the Krishna River.
Naidu’s temporary arrangement, even as his wife Bhuvaneswari, managing director of Hyderabad-based Heritage Foods, resided in their Jubilee Hills house in Hyderabad, gave reason to YSRCP to ridicule him, portraying him as a guest/visitor in the state.
In February 2019, two months before the state polls, Jagan Mohan Reddy, accompanied by his wife Bharathi moved into his grand edifice: a palatial residence and party office blocks within the same complex, built on a two-acre plot at Tadepalli near Amaravati.
Former YSRCP legislator and actor R.K. Roja, who also served as state minister, then showed Jagan built own house to dismiss “TDP canards that if elected to power, he would move the capital out of Amaravati”. At the same time, Roja sought to know why Naidu had failed to build his own house in Amaravati, adding that “probably the TDP chief knows he is not coming back after the 2019 elections”. Responding to YSRCP’s criticism, Naidu commented that Jagan cannot live anywhere other than a palace.
“Jagan needs palaces. While he has several palaces already, at Lotus Pond in Hyderabad, one in Bengaluru, another at Pulivendula, he got yet another now in Tadepalli. Till this palace was built, he did not leave Hyderabad. YSRCP is not the party of poor but the party of palaces,” Naidu reportedly said in February 2019, while talking to party leaders.
Following the landslide victory in the 2019 assembly polls and general election, Jagan’s Tadepalli house was designated as the new CM’s camp residence. Within six months, Jagan allegedly spent over Rs 15 crore on improved security and other fixtures at this complex.
The Tadepalli complex was fitted with solar fencing, a lightning protection system, CCTV cameras and additional air conditioning with a top-notch variable refrigerant volume system. The total cost of these amenities came to over Rs 3 crore, including Rs 80 lakh for an air conditioning system, all paid for by public money.
A Government Order, issued in October 2019 from the department of transport, roads and buildings, sanctioned Rs 73 lakh for supply and installation of new doors and windows in the house. Earlier, Rs 5 crore was sanctioned to widen a 1.3 km stretch of road leading to the residence.
‘Illegal structure’
Naidu’s present accommodation since 2015, Lingamaneni guesthouse at Undavalli, is also mired in controversy.
In response to TDP criticism targeting Jagan’s Tadepalli “palace”, YSRCP ministers had accused Naidu of splurging crores to refurbish the private guesthouse, which they also alleged was illegally built on Krishna riverbed in violation of river zone regulations.
During the massive floods in September last year when many residential localities of Vijayawada remained inundated for days, YSRCP leaders alleged Naidu was also forced out of his Undavalli residence, on the other side of Vijayawada.
The party, in a series of tweets, posted several visuals of heavy inundation along the Karakatta (river embankment) road, saying Naidu’s residence was situated in a low-lying area along the Krishna River—a “location that inherently makes it susceptible to flooding, particularly during the monsoon season when the river swells”.
Despite being the CM, Naidu, YSRCP said in a post on X, “is setting a dangerous precedent by continuing to reside in an illegal structure”. It further reminded people that the YSRCP government issued notices to Naidu in the past, warning about the construction. “Yet these warnings went unheeded, as Naidu chose to continue living in the house,” it said.
“When AP government shifted to Amravati in 2016, leaving Hyderabad, the Undavalli house in the area was deemed fit, safe and secure for residence of CM Naidu, a Z-plus category protectee. So, it was taken on rent or lease,” a TDP leader had earlier told ThePrint.
When Jagan had built the public-funded Rs 450 crore Rushikonda palace in his term as CM, it was the TDP’s turn to allege that it was built in violation of CRZ clearances and other environmental norms while excavating almost half of scenic Rushikonda hill, location of a beach-front tourist spot in Visakhapatnam.
(Edited by Nida Fatima Siddiqui)
