High Court asks AP govt to submit draft plans of State Guest House in Vizag

The Andhra Pradesh High Court, on Monday, dismissed the petitions filed by those seeking a stay on the construction of a State Guest House in Vizag. A three-judge bench, headed by Chief Justice JK Maheswari, further ordered the government to submit plans and budget estimates of the proposed guest house.

During the hearing of the implead petitions, the three-judge bench said that the Court cannot issue orders staying the proposed project when no budgetary allocations were made for building the guest house in the first place. Directing the AP government to furnish the draft plan of the guest house in Vizag along with the budgetary allocations, the HC informed that petitioners can approach the law if they have any objections against the plan. However, the bench stated that it can pass orders only after thoroughly going through the draft plan.

Meanwhile, the Court also dismissed the implead petitions filed by advocates from Rayalaseema and North Coastal Andhra Pradesh challenging the three-capital proposal of the government. On the other hand, the bench also received petitions in the favour of the Andhra Pradesh state government. Saying that they cannot be taken up for hearing given the current situation, the AP High Court dismissed all the petitions.

Earlier in August, the Andhra Pradesh government proposed to construct the State Guest House in Vizag. A committee, led by Visakhapatnam District Collector, V Vinay Chand, had identified the site at Greyhounds Hill for construction of the guest house at Kapuluppada in Bheemili. A Government Order (GO) was also released by the AP government, allotting 30 acres of land towards constructing the state’s guest house. Refuting claims that the guest house is a part of the government’s three-capital move, the state government authorities said that guest houses of such scale will be set up in different parts of AP including Tirupati, Kakinada, Vijayawada, and Visakhapatnam as per a previous GO published by the government in July this year.