CHENNAI: Finance MinisterThangam Thennarasu will be presenting the budget for 2024-25 in the Assembly on February 19. This is his maiden budget after assuming office as finance minister of the state. The first session of the Assembly for the current year will commence on February 12 with the customary address of Governor RN Ravi.
Assembly Speaker M Appavu announced this at a press conference on Thursday. “The finance minister, on February 20, will be presenting the Tamil Nadu Appropriation (vote on account) Bill which provides for the withdrawal of monies from the consolidated fund for a part of the financial year commencing on April 1,” Appavu said.
On whether the governor’s address has already been prepared as there were issues last year, he said preparing the customary address was the duty of a government and it would have completed that. He also said there was no controversy on the part of the speaker or the government last year. “This year, it will be good,” he added.
Ravi had walked out of the Assembly last year when Chief Minister MK Stalin objected to the governor’s deviation from the prepared speech. The house moved a resolution to record only the transcript prepared by the government for the customary address of the governor and not to record the additions and deletions effected by Ravi in the speech.
Questioned about the AIADMK’s repeated requests to recognise RB Udhayakumar as deputy leader of the opposition, Appavu said, “Allocation of seats to members comes under the discretionary powers of the speaker. Even former speaker P Dhanapal has reiterated this point in the past.”
On the demand for live telecast of all proceedings of the house, Appavu said, “Former leader of the opposition Vijayakant moved the court seeking directions for telecasting live the proceedings of the House. But, the then AIADMK government told the court that live telecast would not be possible. The government has been telecasting portions of the proceedings and is taking steps to telecast entire proceedings.”