The government has raised the allocation for maintenance of mosques and churches in the state, a move the opposition said was aimed a wooing back the minorities who are upset with the AIADMK’s support for the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA).

Deputy CM O Panneerselvam announced that the fund for annual maintenance of mosques across the state had been raised to ₹5 crore from ₹60 lakh. The government would spend ₹5 crore on repairs and maintenance of churches against the earlier allocation of ₹1 crore.

Panneerselvam also announced ₹2.50 crore towards annual administrative grant for the Wakf Board. Besides, scholarships to the tune of ₹98.66 crore would be disbursed to around 3.64 lakh students of minority communities in the current fiscal year.

The ruling AIADMK had faced an electoral rout in the Lok Sabha elections in 2019 after striking an alliance with the BJP. In the recent polls to urban local bodies, the minorities are thought to have voted against the party for backing the CAA in Parliament.

This is the last budget of this government, and it has been conciliatory to the minorities. “The budget announcement is aimed to please the minorities and convey that the AIADMK is for the welfare of the minorities. But it will not pay off,” said state chairman of the Congress minority department, J Aslam Bahsa.

“We expected a fullsleeved shirt, but it turned out to be a half-sleeved one ,” said MLA Thameem Ansari. It had become customary for the AIADMK government to make announcements of fund allocations for minority communities, ut nothing materialised, he added.