In its reply, the ministry said the total expenditure incurred on the event stood at Rs 9,35,34,303. The reply was received on July 6.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi's pet extravaganza, the International Yoga Day, has cost the government more than Rs 9 crore till date, a reply to an RTI query has revealed. dna gained access to the reply sent by the ministry of Ayush, which was in charge of organising the mega event, to an RTI query seeking details of money spent on the event, including publicity.
In its reply, the ministry said the total expenditure incurred on the event stood at Rs 9,35,34,303. The reply was received on July 6.
It adds that a total sum of Rs 13.50 crore was allocated for the publicity of the event. Out of this amount, Rs 5.50 crore has been spent till date. The reply specifies that no separate sum was allocated as the budget for the International Yoga Day.
The first International Yoga Day, held on June 21, saw Prime Minister Modi lead more than 35,000 people of 84 different nationalities at Rajpath, and countless others around the country and the world, through a series of asanas and pranayamas. This feat, for which the capital had been preparing in a frenzy, went down in the Guinness Book of World Records for two distinctions -- one for the largest gathering of yoga practitioners and another for the most number of nationalities performing together.
The aim, as declared by PM Modi at the UN General Assembly, in September 2014, was to propagate a "holistic approach to health and well being".
However, it is curious that the same government that spent a fairly massive sum of Rs 9 crore on one-day yoga event to create awareness about health, slashed the health spending of the country, in its annual 2015-2016 budget, by nearly 20 per cent. Health experts reckoned that was almost a decrease of Rs 5,000 crore to the country's funds for public health infrastructure.
This move earned the ire of many experts working in the public health sector as India is notorious for under spending on health. The country spends just one per cent of its GDP on health, as compared to say 3 per cent by China.
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