Vijayawada was to be the capital in 1953

Many today feel Vijayawada is lucky to be named as the next capital of Andhra Pradesh but very few know that it was actually deprived of the status in 1950s. When Andhra state was carved out of Madras Presidency, a committee ‘Wanchoo committee’ was formed on the lines of the now Siva Rama Krishnan committee to decide the next capital. The committee in 1953 toured Rajahmundry, Kakinada, Waltair (Visakhapatnam), Vijayawada, Machilipatnam, Guntur, Tirupati, Anantapur and Nellore and suggested that the area south of the river Krishna and Guntur (between Vijayawada and Guntur) is ideal to be the next capital of Andhra state.

The next option of the committee was Tirupati. Kurnool was totally ruled out as option by the committee as it is remote located. However the then Congress government played a spoilsport. Congress do not want Vijayawada to be the capital since it is dominated by communists then. Congress asked five Tamil MLAs of the then combined Madras state to vote in favour of Kurnool. The MLAs were not supposed to participate in the voting as it is not an issue pertaining to them but they participated on Congress party’s instructions and voted in favour of Kurnool. Vijayawada lost the chance of becoming the capital by a single vote.