Delhi Elections 2025: Poster war between AAP and BJP, money being spent on advertisements like water
# News Bureau December 31,2024
A poster exhibition of BJP in Delhi has become a topic of discussion. It has been named as Tees Maar Khan of Corruption. The basis of this exhibition is the alleged corruption charges against AAP chief Kejriwal, Manish Sisodia, Satyendra Jain etc. On the other hand, AAP has started a campaign on social media to portray Kejriwal as a Hindu supporter. It is obvious that all this is being done with the help of money. That is, both the parties are spending a lot of money on advertisements even before the elections. See this social media poster of AAP:
On Monday, Kejriwal had announced a monthly salary of Rs 18,000 for temple priests and granthis of gurudwaras. However, this salary will be given only when AAP forms the government in Delhi again. BJP immediately released a poster to prove Kejriwal a fake Hindu. In that poster, it is said that Kejriwal becomes a Hindu only during elections. See that poster too:
These two posters are just a sample. AAP is a little more creative in this. Its advertisements are spread from social media to Delhi’s roads, streets and public transport. Similarly, BJP’s campaign is also going on in a very aggressive manner.
Recently, both the parties had made the most of the dialogue from the popular film Pushpa 2. AAP released a poster titled ‘Kejriwal Jhukega Nahi’ (dialogue inspired from Pushpa 2 film), in which the party chief was seen carrying the AAP’s election symbol ‘broom’ on his shoulder like the hero of the film. In response, BJP released a campaign poster in which state BJP president Virendra Sachdeva was sitting on a throne as Pushpa and the poster read, ‘Bhrashtachariyon ko maath karenge.’
Posters of both the parties inspired from the movie Pushpa 2
Advertising agencies and experts working in that field say that both the parties are going to spend at least Rs 200 crore on advertisements in this election. AAP is leading in these advertisements. While BJP is focusing on hoardings and transit advertisements on a large scale. In the OOH (out of home) advertising strategy, both the parties are giving importance to metro panels, street furniture and digital hoardings. Amidst all this, Congress is also showing its presence in many ways, but its advertising campaign is not visible yet.
Rohit Chopra, COO, Times OOH estimates that every party has kept a budget of at least Rs 10 crore for its OOH campaigns during the two-month election period. Agencies like McCann World Group and Scarecrow M&C Saatchi are preparing the strategy for BJP’s campaign. There is also information that Congress has taken the services of DDB Mudra for its campaign. AAP has officially partnered with IPAC. However, AAP also has its own creative team which is finalizing such a strategy.
According to Yasin Hamdani, director of Media Care Brand Solutions, the expenditure on outdoor advertisements alone is expected to reach Rs 150 crore. Similarly, digital advertising is also expected to comprise a large part of the budget, with platforms like Meta (Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp) and Google (including YouTube) estimated to spend Rs 70 to Rs 100 crore.
The campaign budget of all parties is increasing election after election. A report in The Hindu said that AAP, in an expenditure report submitted to the Election Commission (EC) on 14 September 2020, admitted that it had spent a total of ₹21.06 crore on its campaign for the 2020 Delhi Assembly elections. While submitting this report to the Election Commission, then AAP national treasurer and Rajya Sabha MP Narain Das Gupta wrote that the election expenditure report could not be submitted on 28 April 2020 due to the COVID-19-induced lockdown and the auditor’s office being affected. Although AAP had spent more than 21 crores on advertisements in 2020, it accepted only 21 crores. Read further to know how AAP’s advertisement expenditure has been a matter of controversy. This shows that no less was spent in 2020 either.
Controversy over AAP’s ad spending
Hindustan Times in its January 2023 report said that the Delhi government’s Directorate of Information and Publicity (DIP) had issued a notice to the ruling Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) to recover ₹163.62 crore spent on advertisements in alleged violation of Supreme Court guidelines issued in 2015.
This notice was related to the money spent on advertisements published outside Delhi. On 20 December 2022, Delhi Lieutenant Governor Vinay Kumar Saxena directed Delhi Chief Secretary Naresh Kumar to recover Rs 97 crore spent by AAP on advertisements. After this, the Directorate of Information and Publicity (DIP) raised the 2015 case through a notice.
The recovery amount of ₹163.62 crore taken from AAP for advertisements includes a principal amount of ₹99.31 crore and interest of ₹64.31 crore till March 2017. The LG’s order cited the findings of a three-member panel appointed by the central government, which concluded in September 2016 that the Delhi government was guilty of “misusing” taxpayers’ money on advertisements. The panel said the ruling AAP should reimburse the money.
BJP is no less: BJP has also been spending on advertisements. This is clearly visible in every election. BJP has also spent no less on advertisements focusing on Modi. India Today had reported in April 2024, citing the Google Ad Transparency Report, that the ruling BJP at the Center is the first political party in India to spend more than Rs 100 crore on political advertisements on Google and its video platform YouTube.
According to an analysis by India Today, BJP’s share in Google ads published between May 31, 2018 and April 25, 2024 was about 26 per cent of the total expenditure, which is about Rs 390 crore. According to Google, BJP published a total of 161,000 ads as “political ads” during this period. BJP targeted the people of Karnataka with an expenditure of Rs 10.8 crore, followed by Rs 10.3 crore targeting the people of Uttar Pradesh, Rs 8.5 crore on Rajasthan and Rs 7.6 crore on Delhi. That is, BJP also spent a lot of money in view of the state elections.
Congress is also proving to be poor in terms of advertising. According to the Google report, Congress spent only 3.7 percent of the money compared to BJP. It mainly focused ads on Karnataka and Telangana (spending more than Rs 9.6 crore each) and Madhya Pradesh (Rs 6.3 crore).
