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Budget
Speech 2002 - 2003
TECHNOLOGICAL LEAPFROGGING
100.
Honourable Members will be happy to know that Tamil Nadu is emerging as
an important destination for foreign investments in the country. According to
the Secretariat for Industrial Assistance, Government of India, the total
foreign investments approved for our State till September 2001 was Rs.22493
crores and Tamil Nadu ranked third in terms of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI)
flows into the country. A number of major industrial projects are to come up
shortly in the State.
101.
A special thrust will be given to research in the frontier areas of
science and technology like bio-technology, information technology etc., with
the objective of increasing the employment and investment potential and
improving the quality of life of the people.
102.
TIDCO is setting up a Bio-technology Park at Chennai which will be
equipped with a Bio-resource Centre and customized labs and this project is
expected to attract an investment of Rs.1000 crores to the State. A
state-of-the-art
Bio-informatics and Genomics Centre is also being established at a project cost
of Rs.20 crores which will develop and commercialize advanced laboratory
technology for DNA sequencing.
103.
The IT-highway at Chennai will be provided with world-class
infrastructure and Knowledge Industry Townships (KITs) aimed at addressing the
basic concerns of knowledge-oriented industries in this sector will be set up
with public-private partnership. The
work on the laying of two separate submarine optic fibre cable network projects
aimed at providing 11 terabits per second connectivity from Chennai is
progressing well. Upon completion, Chennai will emerge as an important Internet
Gateway to India. An International Research and Development Knowledge Park will
be established in Chennai through the IIT-Chennai.
104.
The Government is also exploring the possibilities of setting up a
special purpose vehicle to develop and promote, besides Chennai, Coimbatore,
Madurai and Trichy as preferred hubs for investments in IT-enabled services. I
am happy to announce that broad band optic fibre network of over 5000-Km aimed
at enhancing the
e-traffic handling potential has been laid in Tamil Nadu and this will be
expanded further. The
Sustainable Access in Rural India Project (SARI), which aims at deploying
wireless in local loop technology will be extended so that IT interface can be
provided in rural areas with the objective of bridging the rural-urban Digital
Divide.
105.
The Highways Department will soon be launching a website www.tnhighways.org,
highlighting the key activities of the Department, letters of invitation to
consultants, bid documents etc., with the aim of improving the quality of
bidding and increasing transparency in the tender process.
106.
Maintenance of Government buildings has not received due attention in the
last few years. The Government
proposes to undertake special repairs of important Government buildings in
Chennai and in all district headquarters at a total cost of Rs.110 crores during
the next financial year.
107.
The Government has decided to give a fillip to information technology,
its enabled services and computerization of administrative process in the State
Secretariat and the district headquarters. An allocation of Rs.10 crores has
been made in the Budget for this purpose.
108.
‘Administration at the door-steps of the people’ is the slogan of
this Government. In order to achieve this objective, the scheme for construction
of VAOs office will be continued in the next financial year with an outlay of
Rs.9.90 crores.
109.
The Government servants constitute the backbone of any administrative set
up. We will take necessary steps to restore their benefits as soon as the
financial position of the Government improves. As promised, an allocation of
Rs.150 crores has been made in the Revised Estimates for the current year for
giving House Building Advance to the employees.
110.
Given the need for constant skill and knowledge upgradation, this
Government has decided to earmark a sum of
Rs.1 crore for enabling our officials to take up specialized training courses
and higher studies in the country.
111.
The total revenue expenditure of the State Government in 2002-2003 is
projected at Rs.26861.54 crores as against revenue receipts of Rs.20628.32
crores, thereby leaving a deficit in revenue of Rs.6233.22 crores. The fiscal
deficit of the Government for the next financial year is likely to be Rs.
8895.04 crores.
112.
The overall deficit in 2002-2003 has been estimated to be Rs.1330.24
crores. The credible fiscal reform programme enumerated by me will
help the State Government extricate itself from the existing fiscal and
financial problems. I now move to present the taxation proposals for the next
financial year.
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