Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Friday quoted a verse from the sangam-era Tamil classic "purananooru" to say that the Modi government will collect only that much tax required from people and not trample upon tax payers.
Reading from the verse written by Pisirandhaiyar while presenting her maiden budget in Parliament, she said, "at this juncture, I find wisdom in a line from Purananooru, a Tamil Sangam Era work by Pisirandaiyaar from the verse "yaanai pugundha nilam" (tthe land trampled by elelphant) which was sung as an advice to Pandiya King Arivudainambi.
Transalating the verse, Sitharaman, a Tamil, said a few mounds of paddy that is harvested from a small piece of land would suffice for an elephant. But if the elephant itself enters the field and starts eating? What it eats would be far less than what it would trample over!
"Mr. Speaker, sir, I begin by thanking our taxpayers who, as responsible citizens, perform their duty by paying their taxes. it is because of their valuable contribution that our government is able to work for our collective dream of inclusive and all round development of our nation," she said before reading out the Tamil verse.
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