 "Tamil Nadu Chief Minister and AIADMK supremo J Jayalalithaa")
Tamil Nadu Chief Minister and All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) leader K Jayalalithaa breathed her last on Monday, following a prolonged battle with health issues.
Even as she is gone, Jayalalithaa’s legacy as a politician lingers on. Here are her five most noteworthy contributions to Tamil Nadu politics over her three-decade career:
Water projects
Jayalalithaa is credited with various projects. True to the nemesis of ‘Water Goddess’, a name given by her followers, Jayalalithaa’s Rainwater Harvesting (RWH) scheme, launched in 2001 to rejuvenate water sources, has improved ground water levels in the parched southern state. It has been replicated by various states and even by the Centre.
Besides, there was the Veeranam project to deliver water to the dry metropolis of Chennai.
People-friendly welfare schemes and freebies
To safeguard the poor from high prices of necessary articles, Jayalalithaa launched various schemes under brand ‘Amma’, which also reinforced her brand equity.
These include low-cost canteen, pharmacies, health insurance, mineral water, free laptops, salt, cement, seeds (for farmers), grinders & fans, and vegetable shops. The cradle scheme, gold for marriages, free cattle for livelihood, prohibition and other measures have also attracted woman voters.
Maintaining law and order
While her critics have complained that Jayalatihaa gave a free hand to the state police, major sections of people, including corporate leaders, agree that law and order was maintained effectively during her tenure.
Attracting investments
The law and order situation and creating a labour pool, including skilled and unskilled, has attracted huge investments in the state.
Jayalalithaa’s term, all of them together, saw some big-ticket investments in the state and over $20 billion FDI. Last year’s Global Investors Summit saw over Rs 2.43 lakh crore worth of investments being committed to the state.
The department of industrial policy and promotion data show that Tamil Nadu saw foreign direct investment inflows to the tune of $7.3 billion from April 2000 to March 2011, and this went up to $13.94 billion from April 2011 to December 2015, which at current conversion rate equals Rs 83,766 crore. Between April 2015 and December 2015, the state attracted $4.3 billion in FDI.
Power surplus
Tamil Nadu is likely to have the highest amount of surplus power among all states in the current financial year.
During Jayalalithaa's tenure, the state, earlier a power-deficient one, became power-surplus. Quoting the Load Generation Balance Report 2016-17 of the Central Electricity Authority, the AIADMK earlier said the state would have an additional production of 11,649 million units during the current financial year.
Jayalalithaa's government had added 8,432.5 Mw in the past five years alone.
