The Narendra Modi government has spent Rs 3,755 crore on publicity campaigns up to October 2017, news agency IANS reported on Friday. The Information and Broadcasting Ministry made this disclosure in response to a Right to Information query filed by social activist Ramveer Tanwar.
The Centre spent more than Rs 1,656 crore on electronic media advertisements, which includes community radio, cinema, Doordarshan, Internet, text messages and television.
The cost of advertisements placed in newspapers and other print media was more than Rs 1,698 crore. Outdoor ad campaigns accounted for more than Rs 399 crore of the expenditure, the ministry said.
The government’s expenditure on publicity is more than the budget of some of its key ministries and flagship programmes, according to IANS. The government has allocated only Rs 56.8 crore in the past three years to “pollution abatement”, the report said.
A bulk of the amount was spent on advertisements featuring Prime Minister Narendra Modi. An RTI query filed by Tanwar in 2016 had revealed that the government spent more than Rs 1,100 crore between June 1, 2014, and August 31, 2016, on advertisements with Modi’s photograph.
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