Mumbai/Nagpur: On May 10, Prime Minister Narendra Modi issued an appeal of austerity to people, asking them to minimise the use of fuel and urging them to shun private vehicle use and instead, take to public transport.He also appealed to people to cut the use of cooking oil, as a way to minimise fuel imports.However, an analysis of the prime minister’s itinerary since the war began shows that between March 1 and May 12, when Modi appealed for austerity, the prime minister has conducted 81 public events outside Delhi, visiting a total of 53 cities and towns across 12 different states, over a period of 70 days after the war broke out.Only 13, or 16%, of his travels were linked to his official duties, where Modi either inaugurated projects, like he did in Noida with the Jewar airport, or laid the foundation stones for developmental projects.The overwhelming bulk of his travel was linked to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)’s campaign in the elections to West Bengal, Assam, Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Puducherry.We have reached out to the Prime Minister’s Office through the Press Information Bureau (PIB), over text and email. This piece will be updated with their response.The prime minister’s appeal, and his own travel, are in sharp contrast to the approaches adopted by countries globally. The Philippines declared a national energy emergency in late March; just around then, South Korea launched an energy-saving campaign, urging people to conserve electricity in their daily lives. On April 6, Thailand Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul appealed to Thai citizens to carpool and work from home, in order to conserve energy.In India, though, the government kept insisting that the country had enough fuel reserves, despite citizens complaining about delayed cooking gas deliveries and fuel pumps experiencing shortages.However, five days after the results of the state polls were announced on May 4, Modi urged citizens to conserve fuel. In the days after his appeal, petroleum companies announced four hikes in petrol and diesel prices within just 10 days.The prime minister’s travel: a snapshotThe Wire scrutinised the prime minister’s public appearances by analysing his X feed, his YouTube account as well as Press Information Bureau (PIB) releases in the period immediately after the war broke out. We counted each individual event that Modi participated in to be separate, even if he was in the same city, since each event involves different logistical challenges – the resources needed to hold a roadshow, for example, will differ from a public meeting, even if they are held in the same city on the same day. We have not included remote events that he participated in, and have focused exclusively on events he travelled to outside Delhi.Using this criterion, we found from March 1 and till May 12, the prime minister criss-crossed the country repeatedly, travelling to 53 cities and towns across 11 states and the union territory of Puducherry. In total, Modi participated in 81 events outside Delhi.In this period, Modi addressed a total of 37 public meetings, held 25 roadshows and participated in 13 events to lay the foundation stone for upcoming projects or inaugurate completed ones. Apart from these, Modi held other events – like meeting tea-estate workers in Assam, visiting the Somnath temple in Gujarat, travelling to Bengaluru to attend the 45th anniversary celebrations of ‘The Art of Living’, among others.A big bulk of them – 53 or 65% of the total 81 – were in the four poll-bound states of West Bengal, Assam, Kerala and Tamil Nadu and the union territory of Puducherry.Of these, 26 events were held in West Bengal, 11 in Assam, eight in Kerala, six in Tamil Nadu and two in Puducherry.In these four states and UT, Modi conducted events of different hues – three inaugurations, 31 public meetings as well as 15 roadshows. In his travels, Modi’s social media posts frequently boasted about the scale of these events.On April 11, Modi held a 15-kilometre long roadshow in Siliguri town, which Modi termed “most memorable” in a post on X. In visuals that Modi posted on his YouTube account, a serpentine queue of vehicles can be seen following his car, as he waves at people gathered to witness his roadshow.The roadshow in Siliguri was most memorable, lasting 15 kms. This shows how BJP’s development agenda is resonating across West Bengal. Except looting and threatening, TMC has nothing else to offer. And, their games are exposed now! pic.twitter.com/ZDGH9omFCL— Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) April 11, 2026On April 19, Modi visited Jhagram in West Bengal, and in an X post claimed to have held an “impromptu roadshow” seeing the “enthusiasm” among people. A video accompanying the post shows at least 11 vehicles following Modi’s car in the roadshow.In a rally he addressed after the roadshow, he described how people had lined up on his 2-3 kilometre route from the helipad to the rally venue. “Aisa zabardast roadshow tha, ki mujhe gaadi ke baahar khade hona pada (It was such a fantastic roadshow that I had to stand at the footboard of the car),” he said at the start of his speech.Similarly, on April 26, Modi’s YouTube channel uploaded a video from his Kolkata roadshow, calling it a “MEGA” roadshow. The video of the roadshow was 84 minutes long.Such roadshows were not restricted to electioneering.After the poll-bound states, Modi seemed to have spent the most time in his home state of Gujarat, where he participated in 10 events in the 70-day period, of which four were roadshows.In fact, on the day that the prime minister made his appeal to citizens to conserve fuel, he held two roadshows – one in Secunderabad and another in Jamnagar later in the night. The next morning, he held a third roadshow in Gujarat’s Somnath city where he later visited the Somnath temple, marking the 75 years of its reconstruction.At the temple, in Modi’s presence, the Indian Air Force’s Surya Kiran Aerobatic Team mounted a show with six of its BAE Systems Hawk Mk-132 advanced jet trainers showing off synchronised formation aerobatics over the temple, while releasing saffron, white and green smoke trails. This show was followed by an air force helicopter showering petals on the temple premises, in Modi’s presence. Some IAF veterans had told The Wire that such a display – which would have resulted in “significant” fuel consumption at a time when aviation fuel is already in short supply – showed a “severe misalignment” with Modi’s public messaging on austerity.Apart from public meetings and roadshows, Modi also participated in at least 13 events where he either laid foundation stones for developmental works or inaugurated projects.Such inaugurations could have been held offline, Modi signalled on March 7 when he laid the foundation stone for the Kota airport through a virtual ceremony.Soon after Modi’s appeal to prioritise remote working in order to avoid travelling, government think-tank NITI Aayog reportedly suspended all in-person events, including seminars, workshops and conferences.Around the same time, news reports indicated that Modi had apparently asked for his convoy to be reduced to half of what it is.In contrast, two days after Modi’s appeal, the Assam government organised a massive swearing-in ceremony for the incoming chief minister Himanta Biswa Sarma and his ministers on May 12. Media reports quoted local BJP leaders who said the party was hoping to draw one lakh people for the “spectacular” ceremony.The exorbitant costs Modi’s domestic travel is largely air-borne, with last-mile journeys on road or choppers.He has often been seen travelling domestically in the Indian Air Force (IAF) Boeing Business Jet 737, one of the three such jets inducted by the Indian Air Force in 2009. Modi was spotted travelling in this jet during his visit to Kolkata on May 9, for the oath-taking ceremony of the new West Bengal cabinet.While the cost of operating such jets isn’t known, a Right to Information (RTI) response in 2016 by the IAF is instructive. While it exempts charging the president, vice-president and prime minister while they travel on official duty, the air force imposed a charge of Rs 5,42,000 per hour for travelling in such a Boeing 737 jet, as per rates finalised in 1999. It is not clear whether the rates have been revised since.In addition, the prime minister also uses choppers to travel shorter, intra-state distances. For instance, while travelling from Jamnagar to Somnath on May 12, Modi travelled in a chopper and even shared a video showing the aerial view of the Somnath temple.