Union government spent over Rs 1,100 crore on advertisements featuring PM Modi, reveals RTI query
The information provided by the Information and Broadcasting Ministry does not include expenditure on platforms like hoardings, posters, booklets and print advertisements.
A Right to Information (RTI) petition revealed that the Union government has spent over Rs 1,100 crore in two-and-a-half years on advertisements featuring Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
The information was provided by the Information and Broadcasting Ministry and the expenditure was between June 1, 2014 and August 31, 2016.
Ramveer Singh from Greater Noida filed the RTI which revealed that this expenditure is only for 'telecast/television, Internet and other electronic media', reported Catch News .
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The ministry even gave a break up of the expenditure according to which 448 crore was spent from June 1,2014 to March 31, 2015 and 542 crore and 120 crore was spent from April 1, 2015 to March 31, 2016 and April 1, 2016 to August 31, 2016 respectively.
This does not include platforms like print advertisements, hoardings, posters, booklets and calendar.
In 2015, another RTI query revealed that the government had spent Rs 8,54,74,783 on newspaper advertisements for Mann Ki Baat till July 29, 2015. This figure only tells the money spent on newspaper advertisements and not any other platform.
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BJP and Congress have had criticised the AAP government in Delhi for spending Rs 526 crore on advertising its achievements in 2015. Even the Delhi High Court asked the Delhi government to explain its expenditure.