The Brittan’s architecture firm, Norman Fosters, had approached the Supreme Court on Thursday seeking its intervention to get the Andhra Pradesh state government to pay the consultancy fee to them.
The Norman Fosters firm had given designs to the state government for Amaravati capital city. The Norman Fosters had also given town planning designs for the capital city during the TDP government between 2016 and 2019.
The Norman Fosters have given designs for the Assembly, High Court, Secretariat and other government buildings. Then chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu held several rounds of meetings with them, checked their designs, and made corrections.
In the meanwhile, there were elections in 2019 and the TDP lost the power. The YSR Congress came to power in the state. After the change of guard, the Norman Fosters have never visited the state, as the YSR Congress government changed the capital plans bringing in three capitals format.
The Norman Fosters said in its petition to the Supreme Court that they have been in constant touch with the Amaravati Metropolitan Region Development Authority (AMRDA), which was earlier the Capital Region Development Authority (CRDA), seeking payment of its consultancy fee.
The firm alleged that the AMRDA did not respond to their representations, forcing them to approach the Supreme Court of India for its intervention. The firm requested the court to direct the State government to pay their consultancy fee.
On admitting the petition, the Supreme Court had sent a notice to the AP government asking it to file an affidavit in reply to the petition. It is to be seen what this government would say to the court on the issue.
