Singapore consortium 'exits' Amaravati start-up area project

A consortium of Singapore companies, which partnered with an entity of Andhra Pradesh government for developing start-up area in the states capital city Amaravati, is understood to have exited the project.

The consortium has opted out of the project "voluntarily", a state government source said on condition of anonymity.

Questions posed to officials of the consortium elicited no response.

The Amaravati Start-Up Area Development Project remained a non-starter in the last 28 months since the previous Chandrababu Naidu government signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the Singapore consortium.

The delay has raised doubts over the prospects of the project, particularly after the change of guard in the state with the YSRC taking over the reins.

The Project was the first major real-estate venture that the previous TDP government had undertaken under the Public Private Partnership mode and selected the Singapore consortium of Ascendas-Singbridge andSembcorpDevelopment through the controversial Swiss Challenge method as the Master Developer.

The then government signed a MoU with the consortium on May 15, 2017 for executing the project in a 6.84 sq km area (1691 acres) in three phases over 15 years.

The consortium was to partner with state-owned Amaravati Development Corporation through a special purpose vehicle Amaravati Development Partner (ADP).

The start-up area, once developed, was expected to contribute 1.15 lakh crore to the state's gross domestic product and generate a revenue of Rs 8,000 crore to Rs 10,000 crore to the government in different taxes.

But all that now appears to be in jeopardy.

In fact, Singapore Minister for Information and Communications, S Iswaran, who spearheaded the deal, promised on June 7, 2018 that in six months from now there would be significant progress on ground in the startup area development.