Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Edappadi K Palaniswami on Sunday said that the state would be adversely affected by the implementation of the 15th Finance Commission recommendations.

Addressing the gathering at the NITI Aayog meet in New Delhi, he emphasised that some of the Terms of Reference (ToR) of the 15th Finance Commission were not in line with the principles of federalism and needed to be reconsidered.

In his address, he also explained how successive Finance Commissions had always been unfair to Tamil Nadu, stating that the state had suffered a loss of Rs 6,000 crore after the 14th Finance Commission.

This year’s annual gathering of the Governing Council of the NITI Aayog, the government’s policy think tank, is significant due to the fact that this is the first meeting after the nation-wide implementation of the Goods and Services Tax (GST).

Speaking in detail about the Cauvery Water Management Authority, the TN Chief Minister sought the implementation of the final order on the Cauvery water dispute as delivered by the Supreme Court.

He also spoke about the need for the central government to take the lead in the inter-state river linking project, by nationalising all the rivers that cut through multiple states. Agriculture, the Kudimaramath scheme (in which a community comes together to conserve water bodies), health and wellness centre schemes, and the national nutrition mission also found mention in his address.

The Chief Minister also said that Ramanathapuram and Virudhunagar have been identified as ‘aspirational districts’ in Tamil Nadu. He requested the central Government to sanction a medical college each in the two districts along with a dental college in Virudhunagar.

Reports said that Prime Minister Narendra Modi, while addressing the fourth annual Governing Council meet of the NITI Aayog, stated that the economy had grown at 7.7% in the fourth quarter of 2017-18.