New Delhi: The Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath-led Uttar Pradesh government may not have achieved substantive success in rejuvenating and cleaning river Ganga, but the Uttar Pradesh government plans to showcase its effort through creative advertisements. The Uttar Pradesh government has called for a tender of Rs 100 crore for providing creative advertisements and campaign paraphernalia to the state government to promote the work of the State Mission for Clean Ganga-UP (SMCG-UP).
Uttar Pradesh is one of the most important stakeholders with responsibility to carry out the Namami Gange projects under the SMCG-UP. Besides UP, Uttarakhand, Bihar, Jharkhand and West Bengal are the other stakeholder states which work to implement the Namami Gange projects.
As per the Notice Inviting Tender (NIT) document, the reason behind hiring an advertisement agency is to enhance the brand image of SMCG-UP and place SMCG-UP as a rallying point for people’s participation in the task of Ganga rejuvenation. The advertisement firm will be tasked to use tools ranging from the mass media and social media platforms for direct interaction with targeted audiences and strategic media engagement. The communications campaign under the NIT is expected to align its messaging to the national communications strategy commissioned by National Mission for Clean Ganga (NMCG) and to any national-level communications campaign launched by NMCG. While the call for the tender is being seen as a branding exercise of the UP government, critics are questioning the logic behind hiring a private agency instead of giving this opportunity to the state government’s own media and advertisement department.,
Officials of the SMCG-UP involved in the tendering process have said that the purpose of hiring a creative campaign agency is to create awareness among the masses about cleaning of river Ganga.
“The NIT for hiring an advertisement agency is not meant for branding the SMCG-UP or state government; the idea behind this initiative is to create awareness among the people and to ensure a larger participation of people in cleaning river Ganga,” a SMCG-UP official told The Sunday Guardian on the condition of anonymity.
“The agency will be selected for three years for providing advertisements and campaign services, it will open districts offices in the state to check and promote the campaign process. A pre-bid conference will be held on 20 August and after that a final NIT will be uploaded. Any agency can take part through the e-tender portal and the eligibility will be decided on the basis of expertise and experience of the firms,” the same official mentioned above said.
The SMCG-UP came in existence to perform the state’s role assigned under the the Namami Gange programme which is an Integrated Conservation Mission, approved as a “Flagship Programme” by the Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led Central government in June 2014 with a budget outlay of Rs 20,000 crore to accomplish the twin objectives of effective abatement of pollution, conservation and rejuvenation of river Ganga.
The implementation has been divided into three levels under which the government aims to achieve the objectives of Ganga rejuvenation within a decade.
Five years have already passed since the programme was introduced. So far, as many as 63 sewerage treatment units have been installed and 12 new are in the process of being commissioned; 28 River-Front Development projects and 33 Entry level Projects for construction have been completed; modernisation and renovation of 182 ghats and 118 crematoria have been started; and several bio-diversity conservation projects have also been started. Besides these, the number of grossly polluting industries has reduced due to a regular inspection mechanism in place.
The Central and state governments (UP, Bihar, Bengal, Uttarakhand and Jharkhand) have signed MoUs with countries such as Australia, United Kingdom, Germany, Finland, and Israel to chart out and develop programmes to clean river Ganga.
The initiative will also help in promoting the use of technology and techniques to carry out the clean Ganga programme.