In 2021, a PCI fact-finding committee was told that the government was “misusing the power to sanction and withdraw advertising” as a “carrot-stick strategy”.

The story of the death of the free press in Kashmir has been extensively reported on by Newslaundry. One major tool of control? Government advertising. But for the first time, we now have a clearer sense of the money being spent.

An analysis of two RTI replies by Jammu and Kashmir’s Department of Information and Public Relations suggests that the Jammu and Kashmir administration under Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha spent at least Rs 70 crore on print ads between April 2022 and October 2024. The top five recipients – three English and two Urdu dailies – got 26 percent of this amount.