Telugu Desam Party president and Andhra Pradesh chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu’s mania for publicity has been exposed at the national level by noted Supreme Court lawyer Prashant Bhushan.
A couple of days ago, Prashant Bhushan came down heavily on Naidu for recruiting 25 journalists to do backend publicity and PR works in the Chief Minister’s Office.
“Now AP CM officially bribes 25 journos to do his PR & publicly work!” he tweeted, along with the copy of the GO issued to that effect.
His tweet went viral all over the country and the national media prominently highlighted it, exposing Naidu.
According to the GO, the Information and Public Relations Department to establish special teams consisting of 25 journalists recruited on outsourcing basis with retrospective effect from September 1, 2016. These journalists are supposed to do the publicity and other related works at the back office of the Chief Minister.
Each journalist would be paid monthly remuneration of Rs 51,468 and the total burden on the state exchequer for payment of these outsourced journalists would be Rs 12,86,700 per month.
“Even a regular recruit in the department will not get that much salary. Why does he require 25 journalists just for publicity? Is it not waste of money?” a journalist asked.
