The Southern Powerhouse

As Tamil Nadu goes from strength to strength, experts debate how it can become India’s leading state

- Amarnath K. Menon

Launched in 2003, the India Today’s annual State of the States (SOS) survey has, over the years, not only become the most respected barometer of how different states in India are performing across vital development indices, but also come to serve as a report card of the nation. The states are ranked judging by their performance in several categories, like economy, infrastructure, industry, agriculture, health, education, law and order and governance.

For four years in a row now Tamil Nadu has emerged as the best performing big state with consistent and credible performance across parameters, even in the wake of the devastating Covid-19 pandemic.

On March 4, India Today held the Tamil Nadu First Conclave in Chennai, the first in its series of individual conclaves to be held across all states in India. “The idea,” said India Today Group Editorial Director (Publishing) Raj Chengappa in his introductory remarks, “is to provide a forum to debate key development issues of a particular state, invite the best strategists to exchange their views and come up with out-of-the-box solutions to speed up the states’s progress and provide prosperity and happiness to its citizens”.

With a gross state domestic product of $297 billion (Rs 22.44 lakh crore), he added, Tamil Nadu is India’s second-largest economy. Chief minister M.K. Stalin’s dream now is to make Tamil Nadu a trillion-dollar economy by 2030, with a focus on boosting manufacturing and services while giving priority to government’s welfare measures to ensure social justice and, what Stalin calls, the Dravidian model. And for this, the vibrant state with its population of 84.96 million can leverage its several strengths.