New advertisement policy for media soon

Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik today emphasised on formulation of a new advertisement policy for both print and electronic media and directed to form a committee to recommend the modified policy soon.

As per the direction of the chief minister, a high level panel headed by Development Commissioner would send its recommendation for formulation of the new policy.

Advertisement policy deals with guidelines to empanel media outlets for government advertisements and also the rate at which newspapers, television and radio stations would be paid for carrying out the advertisements.

During review meeting of the Information and Public Relation (I&PR) department today, Patnaik said, there is a need to engage skilled professionals in this department and suggested for complete revamp of the department in view of the changing work culture.
 

He stressed on use of social media to propagate government schemes and achievements given the changing dynamics of the media and said, there is a need to improve the quality of advertisement issued by various government departments.

"In the meeting, the Chief Minister directed to submit replies to RTI (Right to Information) queries via online and making the entire process transparent by sending messages to applicant's mobile number in each stage of the application processing," said Atanu Sabyasachi Nayak, minister of I&PR department after coming out of the review meeting.

Based on a policy of the state government, journalists of the state are receiving financial aids for medical expenses from the Journalists' Welfare Fund. To make it reachable to a wider network of journalists, the CM ordered to prepare an online platform for processing applications within two months, said a release of the I&PR department.

Last year, the state government had issued orders to insure all journalists of the state and said each journalist is entitled to reimbursement of up to Rs 1 lakh for hospital expenses and registration process for the same was also initiated. However, no progress has been made in this regard so far.