Useless Expenditure of
Rs. 5.76 crore towards
Government of Odisha advertisement, AG Audit Report
· Undue favour shown private TV channels violating DAVP guidelines and SC order.
· No guideline policy for issue of advertisement was prepared by State Govt. for unknown period with ulterior motive to give maximum benefit to TV channels.
· Kalinga TV stands as biggest beneficiary of policy of favouratism of Nabin Patnaik Govt.
· This is , no doubt huge loss to state exchequer .
· Price offered to TV channels of Odisha is even higher that that of National channels.
Prior to General Election-2020, Govt. of Odisha adopted multi-prone and multi-faceted strategy to use media in its favour to propagate so-called scheme and programme of Govt. and highlight image of Chief Minister as clean, non-corrupt and best administrator in the country for mobilizing people to vote for BJD. Huge amount of fund was mindlessly sanctioned to Media in form of granting advertisement to keep them satisfied and work for rulling party. CAG Audit Report has brought it to the limelight in the state.
Govt. of Odisha in Information and Public Relation Department issued work order to different private TV channels and commercial TV channels including Doordarshan Kendra (DDK) for advertisement of 20 Govt. programme / schemes during 2016-19 ( Sept. 2018) for telecast of spot ranged from 30 to 50 seconds as per schedule of telecast in their TV channels and may raise bill on negotiated rates less discount admissible for payments. Accordingly, the TV channels including DDK claimed bills Rs. 7.25, 97,060.00 for the advertised development programme. Out of total claimed amount 6,85, 16,238.00 was paid by the department and Rs.40,80,822.00 is yet to be paid to TV channels.
In this context, AG Audit observed that private TV channels ( including news and General Entertainment channels) had claimed bill of Rs. 6,98, 08,684.00 towards advertisement as per their negotiated price of telecast cost /spot ( “10 second”). On comparing the list of private TV channels empaneled with DAVP, it was found that DAVP has empanelled the news and GEC as per their time band. For news channel, there are five-time bands and for GEC channel, there are six-time bands. Price for advertisement of each time band was varying from one other and maximum price for advertisement of every TV channel was fixed as per their prime time.
It was noticed that I and PR Dept. negotiated rate of TV channels irrespective of their time band . Further it was found that out of total private channels which had advertised Odisha Govt. development programme , there were 11 TV channels which were also empaneled with DAVP to advertise GOI advertisement at rates fixed by DAVP. The details is as follows.
Statement showing comparison of negotiated rate of private TV channels with DAVP rate
|
Name of TV channels |
Rate negotiated by I and PR per 10 second /spot for the year 2016-17 & 2017-18 |
Rate negotiated by the DAVP per 10 seconds ( Prime time) |
Audit remarks ( rate negotiated by the I and PR is higher than DAVP |
|
Kalinga TV |
3200 |
314 |
10 times |
|
Prathana TV channel |
2300 |
625 |
3.68 times |
|
Tarang TV channel |
5200 |
3304 |
1.57 times |
|
Zee Kalinga TV channel |
3200 |
367 |
8.72 times |
|
Kanak News |
3000 |
400 |
7.5 times |
|
MBC TV |
2700 |
331 |
8.15 times |
|
O TV |
5000 |
1197 |
4.17 times |
|
News 7 |
3200 |
503 |
6.36 times |
|
Color Odisha |
3000 |
897 |
3.34 times |
|
Alankara TV |
1800 |
479 |
3.76 TIMES |
|
E TV News Odisha |
3000 |
356 |
8.43 times |
Audit also observed that though Department prepared a Draft policy /guideline for empanelment of media houses and fixation of rate as per time band taking into account the weightage of technical aspects of each TV channel , but the Director, I and PR has not taken any steps for approval of the same. Instead negotiated the price on the rate offered by the channels. After comparing DAVP prime time cost of the advertisement of private TV channels with negotiated rate of the department , it was found that Rs. 5,75, 99,309.00 could have been avoided by the department.
It is worthwhile to mention here that India’s top news channel and GEC such as “ Aaj Tak”, “Z news “, “ India TV” , News18 India , Tarang etc. were empaneled with DAVP and their price per 10 seconds was fixed as per the time band which ranged between Rs. 647.00 to Rs.3304.00 per 10 seconds . It clearly indicates that that the rate offered by private TV channels were also three times higher than the national news channels and the department without considering the aforesaid aspects, negotiated rate and given undue financial advantage to private TV channels.
In the absence of any guideline / policy , the work orders were issued to private TV channels arbitrarily mentioning in almost every file , as desired by higher authority without making it clear “on whose order “ and “ on what basis” . the orders were issued to private TV channels for advertisement of Govt. programme ignoring ratings of the channel which defeated the very purpose of spending the public money judiciously and to ensure transparency in selection of agencies for Government advertisement.
It deserves to mention here that the Department decided to formulate guideline/policy on regulation of electronics media and Web Media separately for delivery of advertisement message to the widest possible messages in a cost effective manner. A committee was formed in Dec. 15 under chairmanship of Director, I and PR Dept. and meeting was held on 18th April, 2016 in which it was decided to frame a policy in line with guideline/ policy of DAVP. A draft guideline policy was prepared for approval of the Govt. However it was never approved.
Pradip Pradhan
M-9937843482
Date- 26.5.21
No comments:
Post a Comment