The DMK, headed by MK Stalin, which had pledged before the 2021 elections to spend ₹1000 crores on temple renovations, has spent only a pittance.
The DMK government particularly Tamil Nadu Finance Minister PTR Palanivel Thiagarajan have come under heat from opposition parties and the general public for presenting a budget that fell short of expectations and not fulfilling the promises made by the DMK in its manifesto.
Some of the major election promises that are yet to be fulfilled, even in the third year of the DMK government, include the reduction of VAT on petrol and diesel, the cancellation of educational loans, the billing of electricity consumption every month, the increase in old age pension scheme, the old pension scheme for government employees, and many others. Despite not fulfilling the above-mentioned poll promises, the DMK government claims to have fulfilled 80% of its election promises.
The data gathered from the Tamil Nadu budget for 2023 shows that the DMK’s election promise to allocate ₹1000 crores for temple renovations must be added to the lengthy list of unfulfilled election promises.
In order to appeal to Hindu voters, the DMK made a number of poll promises in their election manifesto, as the BJP under Dr. L. Murugan intensified its accusations that the DMK is anti-Hindu in the run upto the 2021 state assembly elections especially after the Karuppar Koottam episode.
In one such election promise, the DMK stated that it will spend ₹1000 crores to renovate Hindu temples. However, data from the budget revealed that the DMK government allocated a pittance in comparison to its election promise. Furthermore, the DMK government did not spend even the meager sum appropriated in the 2022 budget.
For the year 2021-22, the DMK government has not allocated any funds to renovate temples. However, though the DMK government allocated ₹56 crores for the renovation of the temple in the year 2022-23, the revised estimates shows that the DMK government has spent only ₹16 crores of the allocated ₹56 crores.
These budget figures indicate that the DMK government has spent far less than the ₹1000 crores promised during the election.
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