Minister for Finance and Human Resource Development PTR Palanivel Thiaga Rajan said the BJP government at the Centre is biased against Tamil Nadu. He cited the progress of AIIMS in Bilaspur and Madurai as an example.

Addressing a press meet on Thursday, PTR said the foundation stone for the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) was laid in Bilaspur in Himachal Pradesh and Madurai in Tamil Nadu at around the same time. However, while the construction of the AIIMS Bilaspur building has been completed and inaugurated, in Madurai not even a wall has been built. This clearly shows BJP’s political bias towards Tamil Nadu, he alleged.

He further condemned the practice of naming all Union government schemes after the Prime Minister. “The state government bears the major portion of the cost, but the name of the scheme remains the same,” he said.

For political benefits, the Union government is naming and branding all its schemes after the Prime Minister, even though the state governments fund them, he added. PTR suggested the GST council meeting be conducted without delay, as states are awaiting the report on the tax formula for casinos, horse racing, and online games.