-The Telegraph Thiruvananthapuram: A central directorate has said government advertisements are "approved" by the UPA chairperson's office besides that of the Prime Minister, prompting the Opposition to cite this as evidence of its claim that Sonia Gandhi was involved in the government's day-to-day running. In reply to an RTI question, the Directorate of Audio Visual Publicity, which functions under the Union information and broadcasting ministry, said: "DAVP is the nodal agency of...
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Records of ad spending puncture hole in Modi’s claims on UPA ignoring Sardar Patel -Himanshi Dhawan
-The Times of India NEW DELHI: BJP prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi's claim that UPA had forgotten Sardar Patel till this year is far off the mark. The government's publicity arm, directorate of advertising and visual publicity (DAVP), has spent Rs 8.5 crore in advertisements to commemorate Sardar Patel's birth anniversary over the last four years. Ironically, the shoe may be on the other foot. In its tenure - between 1999 and...
More »Rajiv-ji aur RTI Ki Jai Ho -Somi Das
-Newslaundry.com There's always outrage at the government ad spend on the death and birth centenaries of our erstwhile politicians. On Rajiv Gandhi's death centenary in 2013, we carried a report with incorrect figures. Following which, we filed a Right To Information (RTI) application to ask for the amount of advertising spend by the government on Rajiv Gandhi's death centenary ads in the Delhi editions of various English newspapers. When we contacted...
More »Govt tightening reins on paid news -Himanshi Dhawan
-The Times of India NEW DELHI: The government is tightening the rules to stop any incidence of "paid news" in the election season. Media organizations found guilty of publishing "news'' for a consideration will risk losing their registration according to amendments to the Press and Registration of Books (PRB) act proposed by the information and broadcasting (I&B) ministry. Similar provisions are also likely to be brought in for electronic media. With assembly...
More »Jawaharlal Nehru, Indira Gandhi, Rajiv Gandhi ads alone cost UPA-2 Rs 53 crore -Atul Thakur
-The Times of India NEW DELHI: The Nehru-Gandhi family, not surprisingly, emerges as the government's favourite when it comes to expenditure on newspaper advertisements on former leaders. Over the past five years, more than a third of UPA-2's spending on newspaper advertisements for birth and death anniversaries of former leaders has been on Rajiv Gandhi, Indira Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru. Of the total Rs 142.3 crore spent on newspaper advertisement on...
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