MEA: `446 crore spent on Modi’s foreign visits

The Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) informed Parliament on Wednesday that at least `446 crore has been spent on the foreign visits made by Prime Minister Narendra Modi ever since he assumed office in May, 2014.

In case of some of the visits, the bills have not been received so far, the government informed the Lok Sabha. As per official statistics on websites of the Union government, Modi has so far made 59 visits abroad from June, 2014, till November, 2019. Some of these visits were made to more than country at a time.

PM Modi is expected to make two more visits later this month, one to the Belgian Capital Brussels for the India-European Union (EU) Summit and the other to Bangladesh.

Asked about the total expenditure on the foreign visits made by PM Modi during the last five years, Minister of State in the MEA V. Muraleedharan said the figure one was about `446 crore, adding that “bills for some visits (made in the financial year 2019-20 were) not received” so far. This figure includes “expenditure on chartered flights (as well as) hotline costs (services of TCL for hotline services discontinued since June 2017),” the MoS informed the Lok Sabha.

As per the break-up of figures, about `121 crore was incurred in the financial year 2015-16, about `78 crore in 2016-17, nearly `100 crore in 201718, about `100 crore again in 2018-19, and about `46 crore in 2019-20 wherein bills for some visits have not been received so far.

GOVT INFORMS Lok Sabha that in case of some of the visits, the bills have not been received so far