The Budget session has already sparked political controversy after the Tamil Nadu government replaced the rupee symbol (₹) with the Tamil letter ‘roo’ in the official Budget logo. The move was defended by State Planning Commission Vice-Chairman J Jeyaranjan, who stated that the rupee symbol, written in Devanagari script, was replaced with a Tamil equivalent.
Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman criticised the decision, calling it a form of “language and regional chauvinism” that promotes separatism. Tamil Nadu BJP president K Annamalai accused CM Stalin of rejecting a symbol that was originally endorsed by his father, M Karunanidhi. Sharing an old picture of Karunanidhi appreciating the rupee symbol’s designer, Udhayakumar, Annamalai posted on X, “What the father endorsed, the son rejects.”
Sitharaman questioned why the DMK, part of the UPA government in 2010, had not objected to the symbol when it was officially adopted. Former Telangana Governor Tamilisai Soundararajan also attacked the DMK, accusing it of having an “anti-national mindset” and using language politics to divert attention from governance failures.
With the Budget set to be presented, the political friction between the DMK-led Tamil Nadu government and the BJP-led Centre continues to escalate.
