If YSRC party president and Andhra Pradesh CM Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy has his way, he is likely to implement his long-pending plan of increasing the number of districts in the state from the present 13 to 25 soon.
Jagan gave a hint to this effect during a video conference with district collectors and superintendents of police from his camp office at Tadepalli on Tuesday.
Though he had been toying with the idea of increasing the number of districts for a long time, it is for the first time that he disclosed his mind.
Jagan said he had been considering making every Parliamentary constituency into a district by undertaking reorganisation of existing districts. As a result, the number will go up from 13 to 25, in tune with the number of parliamentary constituencies.
He told the officials to prepare the blueprint on the reorganisation of districts to carve out new districts. The official machinery is learnt to have started the exercise immediately.
Apparently, a draft proposal is already ready for the 12 new districts — Anakapalle, Araku (both in Visakhapatnam district), Amalapauram, Rajahmundry (East Godavari), Narsapuram (West Godavari), Vijayawada (Krishna district), Narsaraopeta, Bapatla (Guntur), Tirupati (Chittoor), Rajampet (Kadapa), Nandyal (Kurnool) and Hindupur (Anantapur district).
A separate district for the tribal belt connecting the Srikakulam and Vizianagaram district to include Araku is on the cards, it is learnt.
However, it remains to be seen how soon this formation of new districts take place, because the Union home ministry has directed all states not to make any jurisdictional changes from January 1, 2020 to March 31, 2021, in view of the Census operations along with updating of National Population Register (NPR).
So, it is likely that the formation of new districts will take place only after the completion of Census exercise.