A day after a group of men belonging to a fringe Right-wing group attacked two Kashmiri dry fruit vendors in Lucknow, several papers saw front-page advertisements from the Uttar Pradesh government. These advertisements boast about a “paradigm shift in development and governance” in the state during UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath’s tenure—23 months of transformation. They even talk about improvement in law and order situation.

OK then.

Leaving law and order aside for now, we did a quick fact-check of the boisterous claims being made by the Uttar Pradesh government and found some major inconsistencies, primarily in the ones for Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (PMAY)—both rural and urban.

Let’s look at the bonkers number of advertisements which were put out first. While the Lucknow edition of Indian Express and Amar Ujala had full, front-page ads, Dainik Jagran, Hindustan Times and Times of India had different, smaller versions of the advertisement under the fold and on inside pages. Express’s Lucknow edition also had versions of the ad on its inside pages. Both IE and HT had as many seven ads each from the UP government, including a couple from the central government. 

Notably, seven editions of the Indian Express saw full-page advertisements slapped across front pages, as did multiple editions of Amar Ujala. But none of the IE ads carried the UP government or central government logos like the others did. Given that elections are around the corner, the absence of the ad promoter’s name should raise questions.

It was only a couple of days before that Newslaundry reported about ghost advertisers funding Bharatiya Janata Party ads on Facebook. The amount spent on advertising by the BJP and pro-BJP advertisers on Facebook was in crores. Looking at the splash of ads in newspapers, this ad spending would be on a whole new level.

Published across newspapers, these advertisements also make a series of claims. Some of the claims include Uttar Pradesh becoming the Number 1 state under different schemes. For instance, the ones on PMAY.

Notably, the Page 2 advertisement on HT claimed that the Yogiji-governed state is Number 1 in Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojna (rural and urban), Number 1 in constructing toilets under the Swachh Bharat Mission, as well as in setting up micro, small and medium enterprises. In another ad on Page 4, the UP government has claimed to be Number 1 in payment of subsidies to farmers through Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) Scheme.

While the state’s Information & Public Relations Department seems responsible for the ad on Page 2, there’s no clarity about the source for the data used in both the ads.

To verify housing-related claims and get estimated numbers, we looked at the data related to Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojna-Urban (PMAY-U) and Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojna-Gramin (PMAY-G) available on the Lok Sabha website.

As of December 10, 2018, the Minister of Rural Development has submitted that Uttar Pradesh had completed 8,81,117 houses under the PMAY-G. But, as it turns out, other states such as Madhya Pradesh and West Bengal are way ahead with 11,36,250 and 10,11,300 houses respectively. These numbers show houses that were constructed starting 2016. Given that the ads give no explanation about the dates for which the data has been used or the metrics applicable, we are going by the latest available on the Lok Sabha website.

As far as the claims about being the Number 1 state under PMAY-G, the Lok Sabha website begs to differ. According to an answer provided by Hardeep Singh Puri, Minister of State (Independent charge), Ministry of Housing and Urban, the numbers for houses completed under PMAY-U in Uttar Pradesh stands at 1,19,634 as on January 28, 2019.

Perhaps the ads were giving us the total number of houses constructed in both urban and rural areas. Alas, adding the numbers from PMAY-U and PMAY-G also does not help.

When added up, the numbers for Madhya Pradesh and West Bengal are 1,59,916 and 98,409 respectively. This brings the total for the three states to: Uttar Pradesh (10,00,751), Madhya Pradesh (12,96,166) and West Bengal (11,09,709). So whatever permutation and combination you use, these numbers tell a story which is different from the claims made by the advertisement.

But accuracy with ranking isn’t the only problem with these ads. One of the advertisements—the one on the front page of Indian Express—also speaks about the state’s zero tolerance policy towards crime and the improved law and order situation. It states that the Yogi Adityanath government has set about creating an atmosphere of peace and security.

These claims are problematic, to put it mildly. There have been incidents of hate crimes that took place in the state as recently as December 2018. Even the recent videos of Kashmiri traders getting thrashed by saffron-clad men raises concerns.

It’s important to point out that these advertisements, which appear to be blatantly misleading, are paid for using taxpayer money. Each ad is being largely put out by the state’s Information & Public Relations Department. It’s clear that the advertisement departments of newspapers are not in the fact-checking business, they just print whatever is given to them by their client. In this case, the client happens to be the Uttar Pradesh government. But we, as consumers of news need to ask some difficult questions: Why isn’t there a mechanism in place to prevent misleading ads from being put out? Shouldn’t the citizens have a say in what inaccurate ads are being put out with their tax money?

As the elections approach, perhaps it would be a useful practice for consumers to be wary of these ads being put out by publicity departments of various governments.