The Tamil Nadu government yesterday replaced the Indian rupee symbol ₹, with the Tamil letter, ரூ, in its logo for the Tamil Nadu state budget 2025-26, ahead of the budget session today.
The Indian Rupee sign is a composite of the Devanagari letter र (Ra) and the Roman letter R, while the symbol in the new logo draws from the first letter (Ru) of the Tamil word for Rupee.
The rupee symbol change follows protests this week by Tamil Nadu’s ruling Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) and Tamil Nadu Congress Committee over remarks made by Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan in Parliament. In response to opposition from Tamil Nadu regarding the three-language formula, Pradhan urged the state to rise above political differences and not politicise education. The Speaker of the Lok Sabha removed words from proceedings and Pradhan withdrew his words but reiterated that DMK had agreed to a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU).
Tamil Nadu Chief Minister MK Stalin responded on X on March 10, 2025, sharing a letter sent to him by Pradhan. “I was happy to note when the State of Tamil Nadu gave an undertaking dated 15.03.2024, indicating their willingness to sign the PM SHRI MOU in the academic year 2024-25. After receiving the undertaking, a draft MoU was sent by the Department of School Education & Literacy (DOSEL) to Tamil Nadu. However, I was surprised to see that the State responded with a modified MoU vide letter dated 06.07.2024 wherein key paragraph referring to the Implementation of National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 in its entirety has been dropped” an excerpt from the letter read.
BJP members across India and within Tamil Nadu criticised the use of the Tamil rupee symbol. BJP Tamil Nadu president K. Annamalai took to X and highlighted that the designer of ‘₹’ was a Tamil and the son of a former DMK state assembly member. Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, in an X post, also posited that this move signals a dangerous mindset that weakens Indian unity and promotes secessionist sentiments under the pretence of regional pride.
The designer of the Indian Rupee symbol, Udaya Kumar Dharmalingam chose not to engage with the controversy, remarking that “it is up to them because they are the state government, and they had their own reasons”.
DMK spokesperson Saravanan Annadurai said that the move was not a rejection of the official symbol but a protest against the central government’s policies and withheld funds. He added that while the country should be proud that a Tamil had designed the official symbol that this action was about promoting Tamil, and that no law prevents them from using the Tamil letter.
The dispute over the use of the Tamil rupee is part of a wider dispute over the NEP and language rights. The withholding of funds to Tamil Nadu, Kerala, and West Bengal for an integrated education scheme known as Samagra Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA), funded by both the central government and states, has led to renewed backlash against Hindi-imposition. The NEP was introduced in 2020 and the SSA was aligned with it in 2021. One NEP proposal is a three-language formula in schools, in which at least two languages should be languages “native to India”. Tamil Nadu, which follows a two-language formula of Tamil and English, views this as an attempt to impose Hindi.
Posting before the controversy, Stalin said last week on X that the “imposition of anything breeds enmity. Enmity threatens unity. Hence, the true chauvinists and anti-nationals are the Hindi zealots who believe their entitlement is natural, but our resistance is treason.”