9 things political parties cannot do on Social Media

Yesterday the Election Commission announced the dates of 2019 Lok Sabha polls. Voting will be completed in seven phases which will begin from April 11 and will finish on May 19. This has happened for the first time, the Election Commission has outlined stringent guidelines for political parties and candidates' social media activities.

These are 9 things that the political candidates cannot do on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube:

1. All candidates need to hand over details of their social media accounts like Facebook and Twitter while filing nominations.

2. Political ads need to be pre-certified prior to being posted on Facebook or Twitter.

3. Unverified political advertisements cannot be posted on Google, Facebook, Twitter or YouTube.

4. Candidates have to comprise all expenditure incurred on social media advertising in their overall election expenditure account.

5. For campaigning purpose on social media political party or candidate cannot display photographs of defence personnel.

6. A grievance officer has been appointed to take complaints if there's any violation of social media rules.

7. Hate speech, fake news cannot go to social media. Facebook, Google, Twitter have "promised to take action" against this.

8. All political ads posted on Facebook, Twitter or Google will be highlighted particularly by the IT giants.

9. On WhatsApp, there have been no specific guidelines issued related to it.