In a bid to regulate social media’s use by parties and candidates during Assembly polls on December 4, the Election Commission of India (ECI) has made it clear that all parties will have to bear the expenses for launching election campaigns on social media.
The cost will have to be borne by respective candidates and their parties and expenses incurred under this head will also be part of the final poll expenditure.
Besides, the model code of conduct will also become applicable on the social media. In other words, candidates and political parties would have to include all expenditure on campaigning, including expenditure on advertisement on social media, both for maintaining a correct account of expenditure and for submitting the statement of expenditure.
Candidates and political parties will have to keep the ECI posted about their social media accounts and websites used for campaigning, expenditure incurred for maintaining the sites and development of advertisement.
According to an order issued on Friday, the ECI has directed the chief electoral officers of all States and Union Territories, besides the recognised political parties, that details of social media accounts of candidates who are contesting elections have to be communicated to the Commission.
The order comes after the ECI was made aware of using social media for election campaigning and violations of electoral law on the world wide web.
“If a candidate has accounts on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, even apps, then the email ID and the account information need to be intimated to the Election Commission of India. The candidates are required to file affidavits in Form-26 at the time of filing of nominations,” the order said.
“For the sake of removing any ambiguity, it has been directed that candidates and political parties should include all expenses on campaigning, including expenditure on advertisement on social media, both for maintaining a correct account of expenditure and for submitting the statement of expenditure. This, among other things, should also include payments made to Internet companies and websites for carrying advertisements and also campaign-related operational expenditure on making of creative development of content, operational expenditure on salaries and wages paid to the team of workers, employed by such candidates and political parties to maintain their social media, accounts,” the order said.
It further stated that campaigning on the web should also require pre-certification from competent authorities. No political advertisement can be released to any Internet-based website, including social media sites without the pre-certification. This certificate is issued by the media certification and monitoring committees at the district and State level.
Just as a candidate and political parties have to file details of his or her expenditure in connection with the election, the order has stated that candidates and political parties will have to include all expenditure on advertisements on social media, payments made to Internet companies and websites for carrying the advertisements, money paid for developing such content for the web as well as salaries and wages paid to the team of workers employed by the candidates and parties to maintain the social media accounts.
The ECI has also stated that the model code of conduct will be applicable to the content posted on the Internet, including the social media websites, by candidates and political parties.
However, the ECI will consult the Ministry of Communication and Information Technology on the content posted by persons other than the candidates and political parties.