Tamil Nadu's finance minister @ptrmadurai released the white paper on the government's finances on Aug 9th, 2021.
It shows the government has been increasingly borrowing towards meeting revenue deficits, which means, it is borrowing to pay for subsidies, salaries and interests on loans. This is unsustainable in the long-term as borrowing for revenue deficits won't increase state's revenue.
The paper also goes into depth about the joke that is TNEB and also other poor performing PSUs. These are not inherently bad Enterprises because other states in the country have been able to operate their electricity agencies in a more financially prudent way.
Usually, neoliberal governments make these statements about poorly run government agencies and talk about reducing Government expenditure. However, the minister and the chief minister @mkstalin have stated their intent towards being a welfare state that prioritizes inclusive growth and social justice.
While the document makes notional statements about solutions for fixing it, there aren't concrete proposals yet.
I'm looking forward to the state budget in a few days to see how the government aims to tackle these challenges.
I've tried to visualise the Crux of the document for easy dissemination in Part I. However, the document has a lot of info. It's just 122 pages, do check it out if you have the time. It's available in both English and Tamil at tnbudget.tn.gov.in
There's also an interesting segment on devolution of funds to local bodies in the document. As an Urbanist, this is super relavant information which I'll try to expand and explain it in Part II if I have the time. 😅
Let me know your thoughts and comments on how we could solve this.