Page 220 - Leap of Faith inside pages with cover (1)

Leap of Faith Journey of Indian Elections

ENFORCEMENT
Media publicity to Criminal Antecedents by Supreme Court Order dated April 13, 2004. Its ambit was
Candidates (2020): gradually widened to include radio (2008), cinema halls

Candidates and the poli cal par es nomina ng them (2012)and bulk SMS/ voice messages on mobile networks

need to publicize their criminal antecedents, if any, both (2015) and Social Media (2013) during the elec on me.
through newspapers and television channels at least The power for pre-cer fica on, ini ally with the Elec on
three mes prior to the elec ons, for the benefit of the Commission, was later delegated to Media Cer fica on and
voters. Instruc ons in this regard had been issued earlier Monitoring Commi ees created at district and state levels
in October, 2018 and March, 2020. In September 2020 in 2012.

the meline was streamlined and integrated into the The Elec on Commission vide its communiqué
announcement of Bihar Legisla ve Assembly Elec ons. (No.491/Paid News/2019/Communica on) dated February

Augmen ng Media Cer fica on and Monitoring 25, 2019 instructed the Chief Electoral Officers of all )
Commi ees (2019): states/UTs to recons tute the Commi ees under new
guidelines to make them more efficient, broad-based and
The mandate for pre-cer fica on of poli cal adver sement
representa ve.
on TV Channels/ Cable Networks was provided by a
The Elec on Commission also took no ce of the use of
social media for elec on campaigns and certain viola ons
of elec on laws. As a result of the Commission's intent and
persuasion, all major social media pla orms, such as
Facebook, Twi er, WhatsApp, Google, Sharechat, Tiktok,
and IAMAI came together and mutually devised a
“Voluntary Code of Ethics” for the General Elec ons 2019.
According to this mutually accepted code, the Social media
pla orms agreed to undertake informa on, educa on and
communica on campaigns to build awareness among
voters. They also agreed to ensure that poli cal
adver sements on their pla orms were pre-cer fied from
Media Cer fica on and Monitoring Commi ees. They
reaffirmed their commitment to facilitate transparency in
paid poli cal adver sements. As a result of the successful
implementa on of the Voluntary Code in the Seventeenth
General Elec ons (2019), the Code has been implemented
in subsequent elec ons and will con nue to be a part of all
elec ons in the future.

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