After the Delhi government admitted to spending Rs 1,073 crore on advertisements in the last three years, the Supreme Court today said that if Arvind Kejriwal’s government can spend Rs 1,100 crore on ads, “certainly contributions can be made to infrastructure projects”.

The court was hearing a plea on the delay in implementing the Rapid Rail Transit System that will connect Delhi, Meerut and Ghaziabad. On July 3, the Delhi government had told the apex court it did not have adequate funds to allocate for the project. According to Bar and Bench, the court had said, “If you have money for advertisements, why don’t you have money for a project that will ensure smooth transport?”

It then directed the Delhi government to file an affidavit of its ad spending over the last three years. The affidavit was filed and the amount was revealed to be Rs 1,073 crore. 

Justice SK Kaul today told the Delhi government to “either pay or we will attach your advertisement budget”.

Senior advocate Abhishek Manu Singhvi, who was appearing for the AAP government, said the payment would be made towards the RRTS project. As reported by LiveLaw, the court then passed a direction on payment of overdue amounts.

The Delhi government’s spending on ads has reportedly increased by 4,273 percent over 10 years ending 2021-22. Newslaundry had reported on how the AAP government spent Rs 68 lakh in 2020-22 to spray a special ‘bio-decomposer’ in order to tackle the issue of stubble burning. However, it also spent Rs 23 crore merely to advertise the project. Read our report here.

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