With Maharashtra servicing a huge debt burden, cost-cutting measures are in full swing. The state government seems to have found a ‘brilliant way’ to cut costs further – by issuing a Government Resolution (GR) to stop newspaper and magazine supply to all ministers, including Deputy Chief Ministers Sunetra Pawar and Eknath Shinde. Newspapers will now be supplied only to Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis’s office in Mantralaya and his bungalow, Varsha.
The government's bill for supplying newspapers and magazines used to be around ₹22 lakh. This was paid centrally by the General Administration Department. Supplying newspapers and magazines to Fadnavis’s office and bungalow costs around ₹15,000 per month. The GR issued by the General Administration Department has asked ministers to take online subscriptions and make bill payments through each ministry’s administrative offices.
Surprisingly, no minister has yet voiced their protest to this proposal, which will be effective from September 1. They have been advised to take online subscriptions of newspapers and magazines of their choice. The ministers are probably happy that there is no decision to curtail the money spent on their cars and decorating their official bungalows, on which crores are spent. Whenever a minister is allotted a bungalow, the first thing he or she does is get the swankiest interior designing done. Why blame ministers when their much junior brethren – corporators of the BMC – are now wanting Innova Crystas for themselves? But that would be sidetracking the main issue: stopping the purchase of newspapers.
The Maharashtra government has always celebrated Journalists' Day – January 6, commemorating the birth anniversary of Balshastri Jambhekar and the publication of Darpan, the first newspaper in the Marathi language in 1832. There is also a government award for journalists in the name of ‘Darpankar’ Balshastri Jambhekar. So, how can the government moot a proposal to stop the supply of newspapers to ministers’ bungalows and offices? If the government wanted decentralisation, it could have told each minister’s department that they would have to pay their own newspaper bills instead of the General Administration Department paying it centrally.
The first to take up the issue has been the newspaper seller and distributor’s association. They are planning to make a representation to the government and meet senior ministers, requesting them to stop the proposal from being implemented.
CM Fadnavis knows the importance of information and newspapers, as he is an avid reader. As an opposition leader, he used to visit the offices of many newspapers to brief journalists on issues of critical importance to the state. He has visited this magazine’s office, too. Hopefully, he will have a change of heart on the matter.
