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LATEST NEWS UPDATES | EC lays down guidelines to regulate campaigning on social media -Bharti Jain

EC lays down guidelines to regulate campaigning on social media -Bharti Jain

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published Published on Oct 26, 2013   modified Modified on Oct 26, 2013
-The Times of India


NEW DELHI: Political parties and candidates will now have to account for every penny spent on the use of social media for their poll campaigns.

The Election Commission on Friday issued detailed guidelines to regulate internet campaigns on Twitter, Facebook, YouTube etc, asking candidates to declare their social media accounts and all political parties to pre-certify advertisements before they are posted on social media websites.

The instructions also require political parties to account for payments made to internet companies and social media websites for posting advertisements, expenditure on making and development of creative content, and operational expenditure on salaries and wages paid to staff hired for maintaining social media accounts of parties and candidates. Besides, model code would apply to content being posted on internet, including social media websites, by the candidates and political parties.

Acknowledging the growing use of social media for political campaigns, the EC guidelines have clubbed social media under five broad categories: collaborative projects ( Wikipedia), blogs and micro-blogs (Twitter), content communities (YouTube), social networking sites (Facebook) and virtual game worlds (Apps).

The guidelines, while stating that legal provisions relating to poll campaigning apply to social media in the same manner they apply to any other media, clarify the procedure for candidates and political parties to account for use of social media.

According to the poll panel, the candidate will now be required to furnish information related to his authentic social media accounts in the affidavit to be filed along with his nomination papers.

All political advertisements proposed to be posted on internet/social media websites will have to be pre-certified, just like advertisements put out on electronic media, by the state and district-level media certification and monitoring committees.

"You are requested to ensure that no political advertisements are released to any internet based media/websites, including social media websites, by political parties or candidates without pre-certification from competent authorities in the same format and following the same procedures as referred to (earlier EC) orders," the EC has ordered.

The commission also directed the political parties to include expenditure on election campaign through any advertisement in social media as part of their expenditure in connection with elections, a statement of which must be filed after each poll under Section 77 of the Representation of People's Act.

"This should include payments made to internet companies and websites for carrying advertisements and also campaign-related operational expenditure on making of creative content, and 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 EC directed.

In addition, the poll watchdog clarified that the provisions of model code of conduct would apply to social media campaign run during polls. In other words, these campaigns cannot make any personal attacks or promote communal hatred.

As for the content posted by persons other than candidates and political parties, the Commission said it was considering the matter in consultation with the ministry of communication and IT "in so far as they relate to, or can be reasonably connected with, the election campaigning of political parties and candidates.


The Times of India, 25 October, 2013, http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/EC-lays-down-guidelines-to-regulate-campaigning-on-social-media/articleshow/24695055.cms


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