Hyderabad: Holding a public meeting during the elections is a costly affair for political parties. It will cost about Rs 2 crore to Rs 3 crore to hold a public meeting with around 50,000 people. A senior political leader said that a public meeting with one lakh people will cost about Rs 4 crore to Rs 5 crore.
With the withdrawal of nominations having ended on Thursday, major political parties will intensify their campaigns with public meetings.
TRS president and Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao will start his campaign from Friday and address public meetings at Nalgonda and at LB stadium in Hyderabad. He will address about 11 public meetings in his first phase of the campaign.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi will address a public meeting on April 1 at LB stadium. The same day, Congress president Rahul Gandhi will address public meetings at Zaheerabad, Nalgonda and Nagarkurnool.
Congress leaders estimate that each public meeting will cost around Rs 2 crore. This includes rent for the place, stage arrangements, transport, providing food to people, distributing money to people, liquor and others.
The major expenditure will be sending vehicles to transport people, providing food and liquor to them in addition to distributing money, Rs 200 to Rs 400, to each person.
In the Lok Sabha elections the expenditure limit for each candidate is Rs 70 lakh. If the candidate is financially sound he will bear some expenditure and the party will pay the rest. But it is a well known fact that no candidate of any political party submits his actual expenditure to the Election Commission.
Generally, the expenditure in holding public meetings is shown in the party expenditure even though candidates spend the money.
