‘Social media regulations needed to have fair elections’

New Delhi: Social media should be included in the ambit of election rules related to print and electronic media and there should be proper regulation of their content by the Election Commission to ensure free and fair polls in the country, a group of poll experts and advocates said Monday.

Addressing a press conference ahead of first phase of Lok Sabha election on April 11, former chief election commissioner S Y Quraishi said there cannot be a separate law for social media which should be treated as any other mass media.

He said political leaders and parties must get prior approval of the EC before posting anything on social media websites and they should also declare the expenditure incurred in using social media.

“Social media is also media. Whatever guidelines are meant for media- print and electronic- are applicable to social media websites also. There cannot be a separate law for it,” said Quraishi, who was the CEC from July 2010 to June 2012.

Urging political parties to not “misuse social media or misguide voters by spreading fake news”, Quraishi said, “Whatever you are spending on social media should be declared and the content to be posted on social media should also be approved by the Election Commission first.

“There is a committee to approve this – Media Certification and Monitoring Committee (MCMC) which will have social media expert also.”

Echoing his views, senior advocate and Bar Council of Delhi chairperson K C Mittal said the country needs “uninfluenced fair electoral process” and there must be level playing field between parties and candidates as far as money power and media is concerned.

“This is why certain guidelines were issued earlier for print and electronic media so that genuine people are elected, “ he said.

Mittal said social media platforms are wrong to say that “they are not responsible for the content being posted by users and it is their personal opinion”.

He said that social media companies should be summoned by the EC and told that they will be held responsible for posting of any offensive material that influences the elections and will be prosecuted.

Concurring with Mittal, S K Mendiratta, former legal advisor to EC, said that ahead of Lok Sabha polls 2014, the poll panel came out with guidelines for social media wherein instructions were given to the candidates and political parties but the social media was not regulated.

“Today, big internet companies are sharing Indian data with the US intelligence agencies. ” he alleged.

Recently, social media giant Facebook said it has removed over 600 pages and fake accounts linked to individuals associated with an IT Cell of a political party.

Facebook, which has been facing flak globally for instances of user data breach, has been ramping up efforts to ensure that its platforms (that includes WhatsApp and Instagram) aren’t misused to spread misinformation, especially ahead of polls in India.