Even as the row over two- and three-language policy continues unabated, the TN government has added fresh fuel to the blaze by unveiling a logo for the state budget to be presented Friday, using the Tamil letter “ரூ” — which signifies “roobai”, Tamil for rupee — instead of the rupee symbol.
The logo, shared on the official X page of the Chief Minister’s X page also carried the slogan, ‘Ellarkum Ellam’, (everything for everyone) conveying the idea of inclusiveness. According to official sources, the Tamil Nadu government in its Budget documents, has been using a Tamil letter and the English word ‘Rupees’.
“The Chief Minister has used Tamil [ரூ], one of the 15 languages, in the Indian currency. It is not against the Constitution,” an official source told The Hindu.
In a press conference, J. Jeyaranjan, Executive Vice Chairman of the State Planning Commission, aimed the Tamil letter for “roo: was used only to “avoid using Devanagari”.
Union finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman and TN BJP chief K Annamalai criticised the CM, saying the Rupee symbol, designed by D Udhayakumar, son of former DMK MLA N Dharmalingam, was endorsed by M Karunanidhi, and Stalin was being “stupid”, according to a TOI report.
Sharing an old picture of former CM M Karunanidhi appreciating Udhayakumar for the design, Annamalai said on X, “What father endorsed, son rejects.” Sitharaman posted on X: “If the DMK has a problem with the Rupee symbol, why didn’t it protest back in 2010 when it was officially adopted under the Congress-led UPA govt, at a time when DMK was part of the ruling alliance at the Centre?”
Udhayakumar, a professor in IIT Guwahati’s design department, however, pointed out that such a debate was “unnecessary”.
He said,” I used the Devanagari script as the base to design the rupee symbol. It was a competition back then, and I had to stick to the rules of the competition. Devanagari is a script that is used not just by the Hindi language but also by Sanskrit and some minor languages. So, I think restricting the debate to Tamil vs Hindi in this issue is unnecessary.”
Stalin’s government move marks the first time a state has rejected the national currency symbol, intensifying its opposition to the National Education Policy (NEP).
Widely perceived as a symbolic gesture, the Tamil Nadu government’s decision comes amid the ruling DMK’s ongoing clash with the BJP -led central government over the alleged ‘imposition of Hindi’ through the NEP, wrote the Republic’s Digital Desk.
CPI leader D Raja supported the DMK government’s move and said replacing Rupee symbol with Tamil alphabet on state budget 2025-26 is not against Constitution in any form.
“Tamil Nadu government has taken a few initiatives in order to enlighten all sections of society. This budget is in Tamil and is meant for Tamil Nadu… The government has not changed the numbers, and that needs to be understood. Only the symbol has been changed… it is not against the Constitution in any form…” Raja told ANI.
The move sparked widespread criticism from across the country as Stalin and the DMK government might have expected.
However, the silence of the Congress and other key INDIA alliance partners in the debate so far has been conspicuous and raises a question on whether this move has gone well with the DMK’s allies.
Besides, the debate by itself does not hold much water as merely changing a symbol for a currency doesn’t imply anything at all — for it is just that, a symbol and doesn’t have any affiliation with any language. Associating it with a language doesn’t make any sense, at least to this columnist.
Let’s take the $ as an example to vindicate this: The Americans, Australians, Canadians and several others use the symbol for their respective dollars even as their currencies and their valuations aren’t the same. The $ symbol is even used by certain other countries whose currencies are in American dollars such as El Salvador, Ecuador etc.
Does this mean that they all accept American influence over their currencies?
Similarly, the rupee symbol is just that — a representative symbol to the currency of this nation which is known as Rupee in English, Roobai in Tamil, Rupaiayah in the Hindi heartland and even addressed as Taka in some parts of West Bengal. Replacing it with a Tamil alphabet could be symbolic but does not carry any real merit as such.
A slightly different version of this column appeared in Influencing India.