MCG goes outdoors to make money

GURGAON: With the city skyline, Municipal Corporation of Gurgaon revenues seems to be skyrocketing. The corporation has figured out a new source of income, which may run into hundreds of crores, in building wrap advertisements. All that needs to be done is amendment of existing outdoor advertisement policy.
For example, anyone who commutes on Delhi-Gurgaon Expressway simply cant ignore the huge display on gateway tower, popularly known as ship shaped building.According to an estimate, more than three lakh people use that stretch of Expressway everyday, and are exposed to the display, making it mass-reaching compared with other outdoor commercials. The impact of such ads is also considered to be better.
Till now, the MCG which has right to charge the building owners for putting up such ads was unable to do it in absence of prescribed rates in the outdated outdoor advertisement policy of the state.
But when the authorities realized that they were missing on the opportunity, they approached the municipal corporation of Delhi (MCD) seeking details about its charges for building wrap advertisements. The MCD charges monthly Rs100 per sq feet for such ads and has a dedicated remunerative projects (RP) cell. Authorities here have now decided to charge the same rates as Delhi. The MCD policy was framed one-and-half year ago. On Wednesday we sent a reference to the state government to adopt the same policy for Gurgaon. This rate is fairly decent and equal to commercial space rent in Gurgaon. We hope to generate a lot of revenue through these ads, said Rajesh Khullar, municipal commissioner.
In February, city administration had adopted a strict policy against building wrap advertising and asked the concerned firms to remove these ads. While the ads were pulled down, they cropped up again after a couple of months. Today, there are at least three buildings in the cyber city alone that have these ads. Most such buildings are owned by DLF, which had written to MCG expressing its desire to pay for these ads.
A month ago we got a reply (from DLF) that it was willing to pay us for these ads from the day they were put up. While the MCG bylaws have rates prescribed for all kinds of outdoor advertisements, there are no rates prescribed for building wrap ads, said Khullar.
Meanwhile, MCG has extended the last date to submit tenders for outdoor ads to November 11. The minimum bid for 8 video screens and 64 hoardings is Rs12 crore for 3 years and the winner will have to deposit the amount on day one itself.