Modi government spends more than ₹4,000 crore on advertisements; reveals RTI

Ahead of the general elections due next year, every political party’s emphasis is on the promotion of their work. The country knows how much does the ruling party gives importance to the advertisement of their party.

According to the statistics, more than ₹4,000 crore have been spent on advertisements by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). As per the records, the previous government led by Congress has spent a notable amount on advertisement too but the current government has surpassed all the levels.

Right to Information (RTI) activist Anil Galgali informed that the central government’s ‘Bureau of Outreach and Communication’ has spent a total of ₹4,343.26 crore on advertisements in last 46 months. Modi government has undoubtedly raised the bar in promoting through advertisements and that has raised many eyebrows.

From June 2014 to March 2015, the central government had spent ₹424.85 crore on print media ads followed by ₹448.97 on electronic media and ₹97.27 for external campaigning. In the financial year 2015-2016, the central government spend ₹510.69 crore on print media ads, ₹541.99 crore on electronic, and ₹118.43 crore was recorded as the external publicity expenditure. 

In the year 2016-2017, the expenditure on advertisements published in print media was ₹463.38, ₹613.78 on electronic media ads, and ₹185.99 crore on external campaigns. From April 2017 to March 2018, the Modi government has spent ₹333.23 crore on print media ads, ₹475.13 on electronic, and ₹147.10 on external expenditure.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has faced a lot of criticism for spending so much on the advertisements. After the criticism, the government spent ₹955.46 on ad budget in the year 2017-2018 which marks a drop in the expenditure by 25 per cent – approximately ₹308 crore. However, this cost is also high too.

Galgali expressed his displeasure over this saying that the publicity of is a waste of public money. He has also demanded that the government should publish the complete information on the expenditure on the advertisement on its website.