TN govt bites the bullet: Petrol price reduced by Rs 3/litre, exchequer expected to lose Rs 1,160 crore a year

TN govt bites the bullet: Petrol price reduced by Rs 3/litre, exchequer expected to lose Rs 1,160 crore a year

TN becomes the first State to slash tax on petrol and make it Rs 3 cheaper at a cost of Rs 1,160 crore; reveals Rs 1K aid meant for women of poor families

Published: 14th August 2021 05:00 AM 

By T Muruganandham

Express News Service

CHENNAI: When the DMK government fulfilled its promise of reducing the effective rate of tax on petrol by Rs 3 per litre, Tamil Nadu became the first State to do so in 2021. As the State exchequer faces a fall in revenues, the move will result in a loss of revenue of Rs 1,160 crore a year.

“The tax reduction is being done on the instruction of Chief Minister MK Stalin,” said Finance Minister Palanivel Thiaga Rajan on Friday while presenting the first Budget of a DMK government under Stalin.

Clearly, Thiaga Rajan has attempted a balancing act, amid the rising fiscal troubles on one side and DMK’s poll promises on the other. Despite the anticipation created by the White paper on the State’s finances, there were no tax or price hikes.

On the poll promise of Rs 1,000 financial honorarium for women of each household, it was revealed for the first time that the scheme is only for the poor, and hence a mechanism will be introduced to identify eligible ration card holders.

Rajan said the DMK government will again submit a Budget six months from now. He promised that the new Budget would deal with reform measures that will go a long way in stabilising the financial position of the State, adding that he was forced to stay away due to the pandemic. So, the March 2022 Budget might have more to look out for.

The finance minister delivered many messages. One of them is the nerve to stand for principles of federalism. Rarely do State finance ministers announce a council to frame a model to tell the Union government what federal fiscal model it should follow. Rajan did that, and citing a CAG report, openly accused the Union government of failing to spend the cess collected for the purpose it was meant for.

Tamil pride is another cornerstone of the Dravidian movement, and that too was not missed. There was a special attention given to archaeological excavations and other allocations towards Tamil language development.

An assuring undercurrent in the finance minister’s speech was the push towards greater transparency in governance. Many of the promises reflected the idea of using technology towards transparency and to quantify the results of governance. A dedicated e-portal for all procurements by the State government was one such.

Net public debt this year to finish at Rs 98,392 crore?

The revised Budget, with its higher estimated shortfall in revenue receipts, now expects the net public debt this year to end at Rs 98,392.4 crore. As mentioned already, this increase in debt is being driven primarily by the higher shortfall now estimated in revenue receipts — both in terms of tax and non-tax revenues and in the state’s share of the Central taxes.

While the new revenue estimate for FY22 (Rs 2.024 lakh crore) is higher than the revised estimates for FY21 (by around 12%), it is not as high as the 21% increase estimated in the interim Budget. In terms of total estimated expenditure, the interim and revised budgets do not differ by much. Revenue expenditure is now estimated at Rs 2.61 lakh crore against the interim budget’s Rs 2.60 lakh crore, and capital expenditure is expected to be lower, at Rs 42,181 crore against Rs 43,170 crore.

More interesting, however, are the changes made to individual heads vis-a-vis the interim Budget. For instance, on the revenue side, the decision to reduce petrol cess by Rs 3 per litre will result in a loss of revenue worth Rs 1,163 crore.

But, while politically significant, this is a small change in the larger scheme of things. State GST collections are budgeted to be lower than the interim Budget by Rs 3,095 crore; stamps and registration fee collections lower by Rs 1,626 crore; state excise lower by Rs 844 crore; sales tax by 3,272 crore; and interest payment receipts by Rs 1,009 crore.

What to expect

■ Land bank of 45,000 acres to be created in five years, with focus on industrially backward districts

■ Policy for ‘Life Sciences - Research and Development and Manufacturing’ to be released

■ Govt to appoint high-level committee of educationists & experts to formulate State Education Policy

■ 17,980 MW of power-generation capacity to be added through own generating stations in 10 years

■ Chennai City Partnership Programme to be launched with help from World Bank and Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank

■ TN Climate Change Mission to be launched with an outlay of Rs 500 crore

■ Smart metering for all public utilities. E-procurement to be adopted across all procuring entities

HC grants maternity leave benefit to contractual woman staff of state dept

HC grants maternity leave benefit to contractual woman staff of state dept

Jabalpur:  14.08.2021 

The Madhya Pradesh high court has directed the public health engineering (PHE) department of the state to provide maternity leave benefit to a contractual woman employee.

In its order passed on Thursday, a single bench of Justice Vishal Dhagat said, “In view of the circular of the state government, I do not see any reason not to extend the similar benefit to petitioner who is a woman employee appointed on contractual basis.”

Petitioner Sushma Dwivedi, who is a contractual employee of the PHE department, had challenged the February 6, 2018 order of the executive engineer at the PHE office in Shahdol district's Umaria, denying her the benefit of maternity leave, her counsel Ashish Trivedi said. The department had rejected her application for maternity leave from December 1, 2016 to May 31, 2017 on the ground that she was a contractual employee and there was no condition in the contract to give maternity leave to her, he added.

Trivedi told the court that the Supreme Court, in a case of Municipal Corporation of Delhi vs Female Workers (Muster Roll) and another of year 2000, had held that maternity leave does not change with the nature of employment.

It had held that the employer and the courts are bound under the constitutional scheme to guarantee right to life, right to live with dignity and protect the health of both mother and child, and after taking note of identical principles, he said.

He said that the Madhya Pradesh High Court had in its March 2, 2017 order, in a case of Priyanka Gujarkar Shrivastava, had granted maternity leave on the basis of the apex court order, and therefore, the petitioner is also entitled to get maternity leave. The state government in its administrative directions of June 5, 2018 said that women appointed on contractual basis are entitled to get 90 days of maternity leave and women employees will be entitled to get benefits with riders, Trivedi said. PTI

Budget was a tightrope walk, says fin secretary

Budget was a tightrope walk, says fin secretary

Team TOI

14.08.2021

Given the pandemic backdrop, the revised Budget presented by the DMK government, which also happens to be its first, on Friday was a “tightrope walk”, said S Krishnan, state additional chief secretary-finance.

“We are going through difficult times. The Covid second wave has led to revenue loss, while the state had to incur additional expenditure to meet exigencies. In addition, there is pressure on the new government to fulfil its poll promises. The revised Budget has been prepared taking all these into consideration,” he told reporters on Friday.

“During a pandemic, either reducing expenditure or increasing revenue beyond a point will not help. Hence the tightrope walking exercise.”

The approach will be datacentric governance to avoid losses and to manage government assets efficiently, while taking into account people’s expectations. “The focus will be to improve revenue management and to increase revenue,” Krishnan said, underlying the reforms that could be ushered in to ensure social benefits reach the targeted.

TN borrowed ₹40,000 crore in past three months and is likely to borrow around ₹90,000 crore this year. “The borrowings are in tune to handle government expenditures and not just to fund poll promises. Our focus will be to ensure that borrowed funds are spent on capital expenditure.”

On lowering state’s own tax revenue by around ₹9,000 crore, Krishnan said the growth was good in April and May, but fell in June, while July numbers are awaited. The state earns ₹23,000 crore a year from petroleum products, Tasmac revenue is likely to retain 4% annual growth.

DMK turns right to targeted subsidies

POLITICS OF THE BUDGET

DMK turns right to targeted subsidies

Moves Away From Universal Welfare To Fix Economy

Shaik.Abdullah@timesgroup.com

14.08.2021

No more free lunches for all: That is the essence of the Tamil Nadu revised Budget 2021-22 presented on Friday in the assembly. As it slammed the AIADMK regime for “half-baked projects” that pushed TN into an economic crisis, it turned to the right for an escape route.

“What cannot be measured cannot be improved. Hence, a major initiative for smart metering for all public utilities in the state will be launched,” said finance minister P T R Palanivel Thiaga Rajan, articulating his intention to target people for subsidies — something that resonated more with the policy of his party’s ideological nemesis, the BJP. The man who sports ‘kumkum’ on his forehead in a party of non-believers declared that his government will follow a data-centric governance.

“We welcome it. It’s a step the DMK must take. Sooner or later they must follow in the footsteps of the Centre. When the Union government asked the states to make power meters compulsory for agricultural bore-wells two years ago, they opposed it. Now the DMK is forced to do it. This shows their duplicity and contradiction,” said R Srinivasan of the BJP, giving the DMK bouquets and brickbats in equal measure.

The state’s first paperless Budget was also the DMK’s first in 10 years. But the state’s financial situation didn’t suit its plans. Subsidies are being enjoyed by people from all economic backgrounds, the finance minister had complained in the white paper on the state’s finances released on Monday.

Those who use more electricity get more subsidies. At least ₹18,000 crore in electricity bills were under-recovered in 2020-21, he said. He also faulted unmetered water supply in Chennai.

“This was unfair and regressive as most of these connections were enjoyed by huge houses and mansions,” the minister said.

In the guise of boosting capital expenditure to provide economic stimulus during the pandemic, the previous government had sanctioned several “half-baked and ill thought out projects in the last minute” in the highways and irrigation sectors and for urban local bodies, Rajan said in his Budget presentation.

“We have made a careful analysis of such projects. Only genuinely beneficial projects justified based on detailed cost benefit analysis will be implemented,” he said”

Numbers told the story: TN’s fiscal deficit for 2020-21 was ₹92,305 crore (4.43% of GSDP). Each family had a public debt of ₹2,63,976. The average revenue deficit for all states and UTs was 0.1% of GDP in 2017-18 and 2018-19. It was 1.5% and 1.4% of GSDP in Tamil Nadu.

DMK MP T K S Elangovan called it a temporary measure. “We still believe in subsidy for all. The party will not deviate from its ideology. It’s only a short-term diversion, a temporary phenomenon because of the challenging economic circumstances created by the pandemic. We may revert to universalisation of benefits even in the next Budget if the situation improves,” Elangovan said.

The party’s friends on the Left seem to agree.

“The difference is in the intention. The BJP’s approach is to help corporates profit more. They want to reduce subsidies and help corporates get a bigger share of the public money. But the DMK’s egalitarian social ideology is to give subsidies to all those who deserve it. It’s a path-breaking Budget as it would increase the allocation for the poor based on data. The Budget would expand the scope of the schemes and take them to more people,” CPI leader C Mahendran said.

Biryani ad using Hindu saint image sparks row

Biryani ad using Hindu saint image sparks row

Belagavi:14.08.2021

Hindu organizations are outraged after a famous hotel here specialising in biryani released posters containing the image of a Hindu saint appreciating the meat and rice dish. The hotel chain across the city had to be shut and police deployed from Thursday evening to prevent any violence.

‘Niyaz Hotel’, which owns many restaurants in the city, had released the posters on social media where a Hindu saint was seen asking his devotees to give him biryani instead of ‘Balidaan’ (sacrifice).

The poster also contained the caption “Guruji after tasting Niyaaz”.

The caption to the post on social media said, “Our Biryani to all other Biryanis-Aham Brahmasmi (I am divine)”.

The post went viral and Hindu organizations were up in arms over the advertisement. They claimed that the hotel management has insulted Hindu saints and Hindu traditions. Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) and Bajrang Dal leaders met the Police Commissioner and submitted a memorandum against the hotel management.

Local BJP leaders gave a call to Hindus to come forward and register their protest.

Niyaz hotel management later took down the controversial poster and apologised for hurting religious sentiments of the Hindus. IANS

Guv rejects 3 Alagappa V-C candidates

Guv rejects 3 Alagappa V-C candidates

TIMES NEWS NETWORK

Chennai:14.08.2021

Governor Banwarilal Purohit on Wednesday rejected the three shortlisted vice-chancellor candidates for Alagappa University saying that none of the candidates were found suitable for the V-C post. "Governor-chancellor has interviewed three candidates from the panel submitted by the search committee of Alagappa University at Raj Bhavan on August 11. The governor found that none of the candidates was suitable for the post of vice-chancellor of Alagappa University," a letter from governor secretary Anandrao V Patil to the registrar of the universiy said.

"As per the section 13 (1) of the Alagappa University Act, 1985, as amended in the Tamil Nadu Universities Laws (Amendment) Act, 1992, governor-chancellor has not approved any of the persons in the panel recommended by the search committee as vice-chancellor of Alagappa University," he said in the letter adding that the governor ordered that another search committee be formed to give a fresh panel of three different names. The letter further asked the registrar to form a new search committee for selection of vice-chancellor of Alagappa University, Kariakudi, at an early date.

TN extends maternity leave for govt employees

TN extends maternity leave for govt employees

Team TOI

Chennai:14.08.2021

Tamil Nadu has enhanced the period of maternity leave for women government employees to one year from 9 months as promised in the DMK's election manifesto.

Finance minister Palanivel Thiagarajan announced the extension of leave on the floor of assembly during his maiden budget speech on Friday.

The scheme will be restricted to women with less than two surviving children with effect from July 1, he said, amid applause from his cabinet colleagues and other members.

The policy will help the state’s target of increasing the number of babies being exclusively breastfed in the first six months of life, help them receive vaccinations and care for their nutritional status. The maternity leave will help mothers get back to good health in a short period of time, said officials from the social welfare department.

“Tamil Nadu provides cash benefits, free vaccination and nutrition supplement for mothers and babies. But several mothers are not able to care of themselves and their babies because they don’t have the time,” said a senior social welfare department official. “This will change, with longer maternity leave,” she said.