Palla cocks a snook at 48-hour silence period with Facebook ads

HYDERABAD:  Just hours before the polling for two Graduate MLC constituencies on Sunday, TRS candidate from the Warangal-Khammam- Nalgonda constituency, Palla Rajeshwar Reddy, violated the mandatory silence period. Even as Facebook pages of other political parties observed the 48-hour ‘tranquil period’, three political advertisements linking to Rajeshwar Reddy’s page were active till 10 pm on Saturday.

The silence period, or the period of tranquility before the polls, is a feature of elections that aims to preserve the space for reflection before polling day. According to Section 126 of the Representation of the People Act, 1951-reg, during these 48 hours, political parties are prohibited from conducting election campaign activities through public meetings, processions, and displaying election matter through television, social media, print media, or radio.

RS, candidates spend Rs 9L
TRS’ candidate from the Mahabubnagar -Rangareddy- Hyderabad Graduates’ constituency, daughter of former prime minister PV Narasimha Rao, Surabhi Vani Devi, has spent Rs 1.3 on Facebook advertisements for these elections. Similarly, Rajeshwar Reddy and the TRS have spent around `6 lakh and 1.8 lakh respectively on Facebook advertisements. No other political party or politician has spent even 10 per cent of what the TRS has spent on Facebook ads.

The TRS party has around 300 different ads tailored for targeting graduates. Of the 5.31 lakh registered voters, 3.36 lakh are male, 1.95 lakh are female, and 68 are the third gender. Since one-third of overall voters this year are male graduates, around 90-95 per cent of the advertisements were shown to male users, while the remaining few to female users. The age group most targeted was 18-24 (65 per cent) followed by 25-34 (30 per cent).