Explained:How Andhra’s concept of three capitals is inspired by South Africa

News:The Andhra Pradesh cabinet has deferred taking a decision on relocating the state capital to three separate locations.

Facts:

About the decision on state capital:

• The Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister had announced that Andhra Pradesh could have three decentralised capitals on the lines of South Africa.
• The new capital being developed at Amaravati could become the Legislative Capital.The port city Visakhapatnam as the Executive Capital and Kurnool as the Judicial Capital.

About South Africa Model:

• In South Africa,there are three cities that serve as the capitals of the country– Pretoria (executive), Cape Town (legislative) and Bloemfontein (judicial).
• This arrangement was a result of the Second Boer War (1899-1902) in which Britain annexed the two Afrikaner speaking states -– the Orange Free State and the South African Republic (also called Transvaal Republic).
• The Cape of Good Hope then remained in the British Empire, becoming self-governing in 1872 and uniting with three other colonies to form the Union of South Africa in 1910. 

Other examples of multiple capital cities:

• In Sri Lanka,Sri Jayawardenepura Kotte is the official capital and seat of national legislature while Colombo is the de facto seat of national executive and judicial bodies.
• Malaysia has its official and royal capital and seat of national legislature at Kuala Lumpur and Putrajaya is the administrative centre and seat of national judiciary.

Among Indian States:

• Among Indian states, Maharashtra has two capitals namely Mumbai and Nagpur (which holds the winter session of the state assembly). 
• Himachal Pradesh has capitals at Shimla and Dharamshala (winter).The former state of Jammu & Kashmir had Srinagar and Jammu (winter) as capitals.