The Punjab Municipal Outdoor Advertising Policy, 2018 has been amended by the Punjab state government’s Local Government Department with the express purpose of increasing the revenues from the outdoor advertising contracts that are awarded to private media operators in the state. The Tribune, a leading daily circulated in the state, has cited that the policy has been amended in order for the urban local bodies (ULB) to reduce the tenure of contracts to 7 years instead of 10 years, and 5 years in the case of contracts that were given for 7 years.
The policy amendment has been made in view of extraneous factors like “prolonged litigation over advertising contracts, pilferage of revenue and guidelines on bifurcation of civic bodies into zones”, as per a government official who has been quoted in the news story.