T.N. govt. is ignoring Centre’s contribution to State: Finance Minister

Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman at an interaction on Union Budget in Chennai on Saturday.
| Photo Credit: M. VEDHAN

Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said that the Tamil Nadu government is using diversion tactics by ignoring the Centre’s contribution to the State. Highlighting various ongoing and upcoming schemes in Tamil Nadu, supported by the Union government, she said that there is much to be done in Tamil Nadu, but the focus is being diverted towards issues like the three-language policy and delimitation.

“The Central government is committed to working towards and achieving further development for Tamil Nadu. I don’t want to talk about the corruption here, I’m here to talk about the budget,” she said at an exclusive interaction on the Union Budget 2025, organised by Chennai Citizens Forum at M.O.P. Vaishnav College for Women (Autonomous) in Chennai.

The Finance Minister said, “There is an argument that Tamil Nadu has been paying more taxes and hasn’t got anything in return. This is wrong, and I don’t know where these calculations are coming from.” She adds, “Tamil Nadu has over 47 manufacturing units, which is supported under various schemes of MeiTY, and has been one of the largest beneficiaries of the PLI scheme for large scale electronics manufacturing with seven out of 27 approved units.” Also, Tamil Nadu has one of the four beneficiary firms that was approved under the PLI for advanced chemistry cell battery.

Ms. Sitharaman also said that Union Minister Ashwini Vaishnav recently announced the development of two major electronics manufacturing clusters with an investment of over ₹1,100 crores in Pillai Pakkam and Manallur in Tamil Nadu. She also pointed out that Tamil Nadu is home to the second^{largest number of manufacturing units under the PLI-auto scheme. There are 82 approved applicants with 257 manufacturing units under PLI-auto scheme in India, of which 46 are present in Tamil Nadu.}

She also stressed the fact that the announcement of India’s first-ever Tiruvalluvar centre in the world to be set up in Singapore came from the Prime Minister Narendra Modi government. “During the Kashi Tamil Sangamam 2.0, Prime Minister launched the multi-language and Braille translations of Thirukkural, Manimekalai and other classic Tamil literature for the benefit of the people,” she said.