The government has hiked by 25 per cent the rates at which the Bureau of Outreach and Communication releases its advertisements to the print media. The new rates are effective from Tuesday and valid for three years.

Shares of Indian print media companies surge with Nifty Media index rising as much as one per cent.

Shares of HT Media Ltd jump as much as 17.5 per cent to Rs 45.95 in its biggest daily per cent gain since October 10. Jagran Prakashan Ltd's stock rises as much as 8.3 per cent to Rs 124.9, its biggest intraday per cent gain since August 1. DB Corp Ltd's counter gains as much as 8 per cent to Rs 183, its biggest daily per cent gain in over three weeks.

The government said the decision will be of great benefit especially to the medium and small newspapers, including a large number of such papers in regional and vernacular languages. The opposition Congress, however, termed it as “yet another tactic” of the ruling Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) to try and change the narrative in its favour. In the last such revision in 2013, rates were increased by 19 per cent over and above the rates of 2010.

The Ministry of Information and Broadcasting has taken a decision to revise the advertisement rates for print media by announcing a hike of 25 per cent over and above the existing rate structure for advertisement in print media by the Bureau of Outreach and Communication, an official statement said.

The government said the decision has been taken on the basis of recommendations of the 8th Rate Structure Committee constituted by the I&B Ministry that took into account several factors including increase in price of news print, processing charges and other factors which go into computation of advertisement rates.

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