Budget 2021: Nirmala Sitharaman turns to Tamil poetry yet again while announcing tax measures

Two budgets, two years apart, and two threads that bind them together — chief architect Nirmala Sitharaman and her apparent affinity for Tamil poetry while announcing taxation measures. The budget speeches of 2019 and 2021 share these uncanny similarities.

If it was Tamil poet Pisiranthaiyar that Sitharaman quoted in 2019 preceding her taxation announcements, she looked to the legendary Thiruvalluvar and his collection of couplets, the 'Thirukkural', while delivering her budget speech on February 1.

"Our tax system has to be made transparent, efficient and should promote investments and employment in our country," said Sitharaman during her speech, "At the same time, it should put minimum burden on our taxpayers."

The FM then read a verse from the Thirukkural to explain her taxation policy, before reading the translation. "A king or ruler is the one who creates and acquires wealth, protects, and distributes it for common good," she read.

While Nirmala Sitharaman's Tamil roots — she was born in Madurai and studied in Tiruchirappalli and Madras — could well be the reason for her affinity for Tamil poetry, it also helps that Tamil Nadu goes to polls in barely a few months from now.

But even by these standards, the Tamil poetic references aren't new.

In 2019, when Sitharaman was making her maiden budget speech she quoted Pisiranthaiyar. She read a verse from his Tamil poem 'Yaanai Pukka Pulam', before drawing analogies between feeding elephants and collecting tax.

She explained how the poem instructs elephant owners to tie paddy into small bundles and let elephants eat them only in small, regulated quantities. "But if the elephant were allowed to graze freely," she said, quoting the poem, "It will only destroy all the crops."

Sitharaman would then go on to announce a 3 percent increase in surcharge on individuals earning income between Rs 2 and Rs 5 crore, and a 7 percent increase on those with annual income above Rs 5 crore, while leaving the personal tax slabs unchanged. This was in 2019.

Soon after quoting Thirukkural today, Sitharaman made announcements on direct tax reforms, noting how the number of tax returns saw a "dramatic increase" in FY21.

While the finance minister left personal income tax slabs remain unchanged, Sitharaman gave senior citizens some relief from tax-return formalities. "In order to provide relief to senior citizens who are above 75 years of age and reduce compliance for them, it is proposed to insert a new section to provide a relaxation from filing the return of income," she said.