Director Information, Dr Shahid Iqbal Choudhary reviewed the advertisement distribution and payment status at a meeting of the concerned officers here today.

Joint Director Information (Headquarters), Abdul Majid Zargar, Joint Director Information Jammu, Manisha Sarin, Joint Director Information Kashmir, Zahoor Ahmad Mir and other concerned officers were present at the meeting.

The meeting was informed that, as per the commitment of the Government, the Department has cleared all the previous advertisement liabilities of the newspapers and periodicals to the tune of Rs 11.38 crore in addition to releasing payment of Rs 20.67 crore against the advertisement bills for the current fiscal, out of which Rs 3 crore were released today. 

The meeting was informed that in Jammu division payment of all the advertisement bills upto 10 March 2017 has been cleared, except for such newspapers and periodicals which are yet to submit their bills for the said period, while in Kashmir division the bills have been cleared upto 31st January 2017.

Speaking at the meeting, the Director Information said that the Department has already put in place a proper mechanism to ensure clearance of the advertisement bills on monthly basis to avoid accumulation of liabilities. Seeking cooperation of the newspaper establishments in this regard, he said the management of the newspapers should ensure that the bills are submitted to the Department regularly towards the end of every month so that these are processed for payment without delay.

Dr Shahid asked the Joint Director Information Kashmir to immediately process the pending advertisement bills for February 2017 and March 2017 so that the payment could be released to these publications by the end of this month.

“As the Government has already released 50% of allotted budget for the financial year 2017-18, it should enable the Department to make the payments to newspapers/periodicals regularly on monthly basis in the next fiscal,” he said and added that Rs 3 crore have been released today to the respective Joint Directors in Kashmir and Jammu divisions for payment of all pending advertisement bills till date.

Regarding categorization of the approved newspapers and periodicals for judicious distribution of advertisements, the meeting was informed that some publications have not submitted the requisite details as sought by the Department. It was decided that such publications be given on more opportunity to submit the requisite details to the Department before taking a final call on the categorization in light of the guidelines laid down in Govt Order No: ID/A/22/2017 dated: 13-03-2017.

While reviewing the status of online distribution of advertisements, the Director Information called for integrating the software with the government departments, Public Sector Undertakings and Autonomous Bodies so that they get real-time information regarding the publication of their advertisements.

He said the advertisement policy for Digital Media is also under process and it is being placed before a Technical Sub-Committee to take the final call.

The meeting also discussed other issues related to smooth functioning of the advertisement wings in the respective divisions.

Guest