When Delhi chief minister Sheila Dikshit placed government advertisements in 2007-08 ahead of the assembly elections, she would not have imagined what kind of publicity she was buying. Using government funds to promote her party must have helped her win the elections then, but it is now turning out to be a major embarrassment for her ahead of the next elections.

In May, Delhi lokayukta Manmohan Sarin found it wrong and made recommendations to the lieutenant governor and the president to recover the half the amount (Rs 11 crore) from her. On August 30, a city court ordered the Delhi police to file an FIR against her, based on a complaint former Delhi BJP president Vijendra Gupta and RTI activist Vivek Garg, and investigate the matter.

Read more: Sheila Dikshit and the price of political publicity
See attachments below for the lokayukta order

Just as the lokayukta verdict was the first of its kind, ordering a CM to reimburse the cost of supposedly government publicity, so is the city court order, which makes Dikshit the first CM to face a police investigation of this nature.

The BJP has pressed for her resignation, with party supporters taking out a rally in the capital on Sunday. The opposition also plans to approach the lieutenant governor and the president seeking Dikshit’s removal.

As noted in the Lokayukta verdict of May 22, the Delhi government advertisement budget went up from Rs 4 crore in 2004-05 to Rs 22.56 crore in 2008-09. In Delhi editions of various English and Hindi newspapers, what started as an advertisement campaign of the state government, talking about change and transformation underway in the capital, turned into the Congress party campaign when the elections were announced, retaining the same pitch and slogans.

Moreover, the then director of information and publicity department, Uday Sinha, candidly explained in an article in the Rashtriya Sahara newspaper of June 29, 2009 that the ad campaign was on purpose planned this way.
 
While the police investigation, like the lokayukta order, may not affect Dikshit much, the shame factor very well can, if the BJP and the new entrant, Aam Aadmi Party, sustain a mass campaign on this count. This controversy should also lead to a debate on the nature of government publicity as proxy of the publicity of the party or the leader in power – something always taken for granted.