Violating Govt. rules by Govt. Machineries
- Imphal Times Editorial :: November 24 2016 -

Once more, the Imphal Times have brought up the issue of State Tourism Department authority violating Manipur State Government Advertisement Policy, 2013.

Incidentally, Chief Minister Okram Ibobi Singh, the Minister in-charge of the DIPR is also the Minister in-charge of the State Tourism department.

This paper highlighted the issue not because this paper has not been given any advertisement for publication but because we wanted to let the people know how the government machineries are functioning whether or not on the behest of their superior.

Imphal Times, being an evening daily can’t go for competition with the high quality newspaper published in the morning but the management did try its best to promote the quality of journalism through unbiased reporting.

Recently, the DIPR authority had cancelled the empanelment of this newspaper on certain ground and since then the department has stopped listing this news paper for government advertisement.

We know that even if the State Tourism department follow the procedure of advertising the Sangai festival through print media, Imphal Times will not get the opportunity to publish it.

So highlighting the issue of a State Government Department violating the government rules and regulations, the Imphal Times gains no benefit.

It is only an attempt to correct what is wrong in the system. But the question now is who will bell the cat?

Chief Minister Okram Ibobi, who always talks about strengthening the Directorate of Information and Public Relation, is in charge of the department as well the State Tourism Department which had violated the Manipur State Advertisement Policy 2013.

For sure a mere apology to mend the mistake may end the matters without awarding any sort of punishment, even as it is in complete violation of the rules framed by his government.

As according to the Manipur State Advertisement policy, it is mandatory for every government department or agency under the state government to publish any form of advertisement through the DIPR.

Clause 9 of the Manipur State Advertisement Policy says that All Government advertisements, both classified and display shall be released through DIPR only.

And clause 24 of the state advertisement policy clearly mention that if any Government advertisement is issued in violation of the provisions of clause 9, the head of Department /Office concerned will be personally responsible for payment of advertisement bills from his/her personal account.

Again the clause 25 of the advertisement policy also said that Treasury officers/Sub-Treasury Officers shall withhold bills for payment of govt. advertisement which have not been routed through DIPR.

So as per the rules all advertisement published in print media by skipping the DIPR shall have to bear the cost of the advertisement by the head of department themselves without affecting the budget allocated.

Budget allocation for the year 2016-17 for the Department of Tourism is only 3752.44 lakhs. Here at this point we would like to draw the attention of the Accountant General Office which audited the account statement of every department.

The issue Imphal Times takes up is not for any personal beneficiary but for the benefit of all small medium newspapers in the region.