Andhra Pradesh chief minister will visit Astana, the capital city of Kazakhstan, during his Russian trip next week.
Naidu has been highly inspired by the city planning of Singapore. However, he has mentioned several times that he would incorporate state-of-the-art ideas from the world's best capital cities, including Astana.
Though the CM is visiting Russia to participate in Yekaterinburg’s international trade fair, he feels the urban-planning charms of St Petersburg, Moscow and Astana are worth an extended tour.
According to officials in the CMO, it was Prime Minister Modi who advised Naidu to visit the best capitals in the world before planning Amaravati for Andhra Pradesh. And as a fellow frequent traveller, PM Modi is among the best to share this advice.
"Like Astana, which is built on the banks of River Ishim, Amaravati is also coming up on the banks of River Krishna. Amaravati also will have a vertical structure like the Kazakh capital,” CM Naidu once told the media.
As Naidu himself has shared on several occasions, Prime Minister Modi advised him to visit two cities in particular. They are Astana (Kazakhstan) and Ashgabat (Turkmenistan). Naidu has already sent official teams to Astana in the past. But now that he will be a mere 1141 km from the capital city of Kazakhstan, the Russian trip seems to have been extended to incorporate a visit.
Incidentally, PM visited both Astana and Ashgabat (Capital of Turkmenistan) during his Central Asian trips in July 2015. Naidu will leave for Central Asia on June 9 with a 12-member delegation.
