Tamil Nadu Finance Minister D Jayakumar on Thursday presented a revenue deficit budget for the year 2017-2018 sparing the common man from any new tax. While the minister blamed the demonetisation of high value currency notes by the Centre for the State's financial woes, he said the UDAY Scheme launched by the Centre would help Tamil Nadu in easing some of the financial constraints. The minister said in his speech that the decision to join the UDAY scheme would help the State to save Rs 1335 crore.
The Finance Minister said the total revenue for the year 2017 to 2018 would be Rs 1,59,363 crore while the total expenditure would be Rs 1,75,293 crore which leaves State with a financial deficit of Rs 15,930 crore, Tamil Nadu's debt stands at Rs 3,14,366 crore, he said. Jayakumar's budget estimates include the Rs 62,138 crore assistance the Tamil Nadu Government has sought from the Centre for drought relief and cyclone Varadah relief and reconstruction works.
Though there were expectation of a series of welfare schemes in this year's budget, in the backdrop of the ensuing RK Nagar by-poll and the elections to the local bodies, Jayakumar played it safe without announcing any popular schemes. Taking a cue from the Union budget which had hiked the allocation for Mahatma Gandhi National Rural employment Guarantee Programme, Jayakumar increased the compulsory working days from the present 100 days to 150 days.
Tamil Nadu Government also decided to disband the State Planning Commission and set up State Development Policy Council to advise the Government on policy coherence and formulation of programmes to guide the development of the State.
M K Stalin, leader of the Opposition, described the budget as dull and devoid of any development initiatives. "There are no announcements about new power generation programmes or loan waivers of farmers who are facing the worst ever crisis," said Stalin.
But the Tamil Nadu unit of the Confederation of Indian Industry welcomed the budget proposal to allocate Rs 1400 crore for the Smart Cities Mission and various measures towards improving the infrastructure and business climate in the State. S Kalyanaranan, former banker with the Asian Development Bank described the budget as listless. "There are no proposals to generate jobs which is the crucial force to sustain development and growth," he said.
The Pattali Makkal Katchi, which had presented a shadow budget for Tamil Nadu, expressed unhappiness and disappointment over the failure of the AIADMK Government to implement at least one of the suggestions proposed by it.
S Ramadoss, the party founder had suggested that the Government could mobilise at least Rs 85,000 crore per year by regulating the granite and beach sand mining operations in
Tamil Nadu.