The Karnataka Forest Department is under scrutiny for bypassing the mandatory tender process and outsourcing the management of its social media accounts and promotional campaigns to a single private firm through a special exemption. This move is now raising serious questions about accountability and transparency in government spending.
Documents obtained through an RTI reveal that instead of inviting competitive bids to manage its official social media presence and run awareness campaigns, the department directly chose Samvida Communications (OPC) Private Limited under a special clause known as 4(G) exemption in the Karnataka Transparency in Public Procurement (KTPP) Act.
The department’s justification? Officials argued that if they went through a tender process, it would be “difficult” to find an agency that could meet all their specific needs — from technical wildlife content to multilingual communication, video production, event promotions and more — all under one roof.
However, the Finance Department had flagged this move, clearly questioning why an open tender could not be conducted and demanding a valid explanation of what “difficulties” the department faced that prevented it from inviting competitive bids.
A costly exclusive deal
According to documents, Samvida Communications first approached the Forest Department on April 26, 2023, with an unsolicited proposal, claiming extensive experience in managing social media, developing communication strategies, and producing promotional content for conservation work.
The firm offered a detailed commercial plan: to handle all the department’s social media platforms — Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube — for 52 weeks, create posters, banners for 40 events a year, design and publish monthly newsletters, booklets and brochures, develop TV and radio campaigns with celebrities and influencers, and even produce coffee-table books and short films to be screened in multiplexes and rural areas.
The estimated annual cost? Nearly Rs 30 lakh, including GST. The Forest Department, in its files, praised Samvida for its work with them over the past three years and argued that the company possesses the right expertise to handle complex and sensitive wildlife conservation communication. It also claimed that splitting these services across multiple agencies would disrupt day-to-day operations.
Is the department getting value for money?
Ironically, while the department claims it needs a “professional” firm to boost its public outreach, its own social media performance tells another story.
According to insiders, the Forest Department’s social media pages are among the least active of any state department, despite being one of the largest holders of sensitive, crucial public information.
For instance, five tigers died under unnatural circumstances recently, yet there was not a single update on any official platform. Instead, generic posts about International Day Against Drug Abuse or trivia about frogs and snakes are routinely shared — information easily available on Wikipedia or Google.
“The Forest Department should be the most visible and vocal about rivers, forests, wildlife, encroachment drives, human-animal conflict — the issues people really need to know. But its feeds are mostly dead or full of generic copy-paste content,” says an officer on condition of anonymity.
In Bengaluru alone, forest lands worth hundreds of crores have been recovered from encroachers in just the last year and a half. Yet, there is no sign of this major achievement on the department’s Facebook, Twitter or Instagram handles.
Even when the department relocates rogue elephants to prevent conflict with villagers, or frontline forest guards receive protective kits from ministers, these events often fail to find a presence online.
The department recently appointed former cricketer Anil Kumble as its brand ambassador. However, this significant development was posted online only ten days after the appointment was made official, highlighting the delayed and patchy nature of the updates.
