JUST SPAMMING | A Nuanced Blame Game Through White Papers

The recent ‘White Paper’ brought out by the TVK government in the State became a subject of discussion in a plethora of forums. One of the charges that flew out of the discussions was that it was an exercise aimed at telling the people that the previous government had left the State’s economy in shambles, particularly through its borrowings. The Finance Minister in the DMK regime, Thangam Thenarasu, challenged the present government to keep its borrowing to a level lesser than the DMK and offered to quit politics if they accomplished it. Since the exercise looks like a continuation of the acrimonious campaign the people witnessed in the run up to the elections, many people are left wondering what a ‘white paper’ actually is.

Well, the purpose of a white paper is not to trigger an exchange of charges and counter charges that can leave the common people bewildered. On the contrary, a white paper is defined as an informational document or an in-depth authoritative report designed to educate readers on a complex issue and present a specific philosophy or solution. While white papers were originally used by governments to outline policy, in the modern times they are widely used in business and technology as marketing tools. But the TVK government that has seemingly made a bid to besmirch the previous DMK regime through the latest white paper cannot be fully blamed for using a tool like that to demonize the predecessor because the DMK, when it came to power in 2021, did the same thing.

While it is not clear if any earlier new government in Tamil Nadu had resorted to that sort of a subtle attack, through an academic exercise, in 2021, the then new government came out with a document titled ‘White Paper on Tamil Nadu Government’s Finances,’ which was nothing more than a nuanced way of running down the previous AIADMK government. The report says ‘A serious cause of concern for Tamil Nadu over the past decade has been the slowdown in economic growth from the peak it had reached in 2011-12.’ Through charts and graphs the 122-page report presented a gloomy picture of the State’s financial condition and compared it with the situation in other States - Gujarat, Karnataka and Maharashtra.

Interestingly, it is with those three States that the present White Paper, presented by State Finance Minister N Marie Wilson, is also compared. The ‘White Paper on the Fiscal Management of Tamil Nadu – An examination of Public Finances, 2021-22 to 2025-26’ primarily blames the previous DMK government on many counts, particularly the doubling of outstanding debt in five years. It also makes allegations like ‘The State’s own-tax effort has collapsed’ and ‘Committed expenditure has squeezed out development.’ Another doomsday prediction of the White Paper reads: ‘Karnataka, Maharashtra and Gujarat improved or stabilized their fiscal positions over the same five years; Tamil Nadu worsened on every major indicator, and the year ahead offers little immediate relief.’

Both the White Papers, brought out in 2026 and 2021 talk about mounting debts. ‘We must contain our interest costs in order to minimize or reduce our revenue deficit. That will require us to bring our debt relative to GSDP under control. In any democratic country it is difficult for the Government to drastically cut spending. Much less so when a newly elected Government has promises to fulfill, that will require significant additional spending. So, revenues will have to be raised in an equitable manner, as debt will otherwise balloon, and interest payments will overwhelm the Budget. In the last 3 to 4 years borrowing has been resorted to even for non-discretionary spending like salaries, pension and interest payments which were for many years before met out of the regular revenue receipts of the Government. This practice must be stopped,’ the DMK said in 2021.

But in 2026, the same charge has been leveled against it by the new regime and it seems to be nonchalant about it, which raises the question as to what was done during the five-year regime of the DMK to solve a problem that it had flagged when it came to power. The DMK’s report in 2021 said ‘Our conviction that this Government can reverse the decline and lift Tamil Nadu to its rightful place, arises from the Hon’ble Chief Minister’s strong leadership and his often-stated policy of a transparent government, which continuously engages with civil society and is committed to providing the highest quality of administration.’

Similarly the Chief Minister C Joseph Vijay, in his preface to the TVK government’s White Paper, after clearly stating that the structural deterioration in the State’s finances, if left unaddressed, would compound with each passing year and would fall hardest on the generation least able to bear it, says ‘Yet this is not a counsel of despair. Tamil Nadu possesses the economic strength, the institutional depth and the human resources to restore its fiscal health.’ To sum it up, both the White Papers read the same: the previous government had goofed up and let the finances go downhill but there is nothing to worry about as it could be changed through concerted efforts. Both documents are replete with jargon, tables and charts that it is difficult for the common man to clearly understand anything beyond the fact that there is nothing hunky dory about the State’s economy, which, of course, the people know even without white papers.