Impact of Land Pooling Scheme on Key Economic Variables in the Capital City Area (Amaravati) of Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh Government has found a solution to the troubles of land acquisition in building a new capital city (Amaravati) on 34,690 acres of farm land by using land pooling scheme. Amaravati is the India’s first planned capital of a state to build up from scratch in the recent decades. The Government strategy was to make all farmers stakeholders in the new capital, so that they voluntarily “pooled” their land with the city development agency known as Andhra Pradesh Capital Region Development Authority shortly known as APCRDA. The land parcels owned by individuals or group of owners are legally consolidated by transfer of ownership rights to the authority, which later transfers the ownership of a part of the developed land back to the landowners. Land owners were also given some social and economic benefits for a certain period for participating in Land Pooling scheme along with the return of part of the developed land. As the land owners contribute their land voluntarily, the whole land pooling process was very smooth. The pooling process mostly did not disrupt the current inhabitants. In this context, an attempt is made in this paper to examine the impact of Land Pooling Scheme on key economic variables in the capital city area (Amaravati) of Andhra Pradesh.