The New Indian Express            07.06.2013

MC incurs heavy losses on outdoor advertising

The Ludhiana Municipal Corporation is incurring heavy losses in the department of outdoor advertising as contractors are using more than double the allotted number of sites.

As per the official records of MC accessed by Ludhiana Newsline, the civic body has allotted to two contractors only 488 sites for advertising in the whole city but the actual sites being used are double the allotted numbers.

As per the document, the MC has allotted 220 unipoles (single poles), 38 overhead signages, four foot overbridges, six roundabouts, nine kiosks on roads and allowed ads at 12 garbage collection centres and some pillars of elevated roads.

But actually, flouting norms, the contractors are allotting double number of sites to the customers for advertising and MC is incurring heavy losses as it is getting zero revenue from those illegal sites.

Inder Aggarwal, councillor, Shingar road ward number 18, who submitted the complaint in this regard to advertising department head Isha Kalia on Thursday, told Ludhiana Newsline, "I personally counted number of advertising sites in city and even after rough estimates, they come out to be more than 1,000 which is more than double the allotted sites. MC needs to re-introduce the outdoor advertising policy in a proper way and put unique identity numbers on every site to maintain the exact number."

Contracts of two advertising contractors are due to expire in July and September respectively. Aggarwal in his complaint has also demanded blacklisting of faulty contractors. "MC now need not waste any more time and introduce new advertising policy as soon as possible to cover the losses," said Aggarwal.

When contacted, Mayor Harcharan Singh Gohalwaria said, "Our new outdoor advertising policy is ready and once it is implemented, things will be properly channelised."