The government spent Rs 2,586 crore on advertisements promoting Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his achievements over the past five years, an RTI query revealed, with digital and social media ad spending surging more than tenfold to Rs 131.35 crore.
Public expenditure on advertisements of Prime Minister Narendra Modi has been a contentious issue in the Parliament and has attracted frequent criticism.
Further information followed an RTI query by former TMC MP Saket Gokhale.
The Central Bureau of Communication (CBC) under the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (I&B) responded to his query that Rs 2,586 crore was spent on promoting the PM and his government’s achievements.
According to the Indian Express, the money was spent on newspapers, TV, radio and hoardings among other things.
Expenditure on digital and social media advertising has been at a record high in the past five years; it has grown more than tenfold from Rs 14 crore in 2020-21 to Rs 131.35 crore in 2025-26.
On the other hand, expenditure on print media rose from Rs 83.16 crore in 2024-25 to Rs 338 crore in 2025-26.
Expenditure on hoardings reflects electoral favouritism as Ad spending fell to a five-year low of Rs 32.76 crore in 2022-23, which was a year before the general elections.
As per a report by National Herald, the CBC did not disclose the names of the media outlets and agencies in the response.
Citing it as Commercial Confidence, CBC officials said, “Disclosing the names would be inappropriate, despite public interest in knowing how the government spends taxpayers’ money.”
To be clear, this does not include other ministries’ and public sector undertakings’ ad spending or political party expenditures, they added.
According to a Newslaundry report, it is worth pointing out that public expenditure for advertisement, both in a general sense as well as relating to the image of the Prime Minister, has been considerable.
As reported in the Rajya Sabha, the government expenditure on ads has been considerable during the last five years.
In the financial years 2020-21 to 2025-26, there will be a government expenditure of about Rs 2,447 crore on advertisements, equivalent to Rs 1.34 crore per day.
In this, there will be a total expenditure of Rs 985 crore on audio-visual media, Rs 930.24 crore on print media, Rs 392.51 crore on outdoor advertising and Rs 138.71 crore on digital media.
Comparing the expenditure on publicity in Uttar Pradesh between 2017-18 and 2024-25, more than 83 per cent of the total expenditure of 5,658.16 crore rupees was spent on advertising and visual publicity through newspapers and television in the state.
The highest expenditure in terms of advertising was made by UP, amounting to Rs 227.44 crore in 2022-23, which was only Rs 29.69 crore in 2017-18.
