The accusations against the Modi Government about advertisement spending are uninformed and unfounded
- In Current Affairs
- 03:37 AM, Mar 15, 2019
- Mayank Mishra
There has been a lot of noise about how Modi Government has spent huge amount on Advertisements. There was an RTI enquiring about the sum spent by government on Advertisements after which we saw a number of articles being written about the excessive spending on advertisement. Most of these articles had just absolute numbers quoted out of context to make a case against the Modi Government.
We first need to understand the meaning of government spending on advertisement. This isn't the BJP advertising about itself using your money like the opposition makes it sound. It is government creating awareness about its schemes.
Now let’s check the list of few schemes launched by Modi govt.
Jan Dhan Yojana
Beti Bachao Beti Padhao
Aadhar and Aadhar linking
Swach Bharat Abhiyan
Ujjwala Yojana
Mudra Yojana
Jeevan Jyoti Bima Yojana
Atal Pension Yojna
Digital Yojna
Skill India
As one can note above, most of the major schemes launched by the Modi government were targeted towards the common man mainly coming from the economically lower sections of the society. The section which usually falls easy prey to the Left and Congress leaning media's false propaganda. These are not UPA era schemes which were mainly either subsidising something or distributing cash. Schemes by the Modi government were structural changes and required large scale public participation so naturally advertisements to create awareness played a major role in success of these schemes
To give you a few examples the Modi government allotted more money to MGNREGA than UPA ever did but did not advertise as aggressively as UPA because the system was already in place. Also the Mann Ki Baat show resulted in net profit to AIR which wouldn't have been the case had there been excessive advertisement.
Here is an example on how they twist the facts. A response to recent RTI query was circulated to convey a message that a major chunk of Beti Padhao Beti Bachao was spent on advertisement but the scheme by very nature is an awareness scheme so it was obvious that major spending will be on advertisements.
In India you can't just put a system in place and expect things to happen. You have to explain and convince people, spread awareness and create a movement and only then will you achieve something. Two people from Gujarat, namely Modi and Gandhi mastered it. Hence the additional expenditure.
So guys vote for the man who doesn't just put up the advertisements while launching the schemes but also puts up a report card submitting to people the success or failure report of those schemes like PM Modi has done.
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