BJP – The Digital Party

It is a well known fact that Prime Minister Narendra Modi is very active on digital media, and, among other platforms, he has 46.2 million followers on twitter – being the highest number in the country. This digital trend of his seems to be rubbing off on his party as well, with the BJP and its supporters accounting for a lion’s share of total political advertising worth over ₹ 4 crore on Facebook within a span of a month, according to data compiled by the social media giant.

From February till March 2^nd 2019, Facebook showed 16,556 ads related to politics and issues of national importance of the BJP with ad spends crossing more than ₹ 4.13 crore, according to Facebook’s Ad Archive Report. Ads ranging from promotion of PM Modi and his government policies, to those of its leaders including BJP President Amit Shah – all of which were not necessarily paid for by the party, but by its supporters.

The Congress and its supporters are known to have spent much lesser amounts in comparison. Facebook, which has over 200 million users in India, has promised to infuse more transparency for political advertisements on their platform and have announced a slew of measures including carrying disclaimers offering details about those responsible for running ads.

Social media aside, this year’s general election will be the biggest for India’s advertising market. In 2014, parties spent about ₹ 1,500 crore on advertising. This time around, the figure is expected to be around the ₹ 2,500 to 2,600 crore mark, which signifies a surge of 73% according to experts, making it the most expensive by marketing spends.

Digital spending is expected to spike as parties try to connect with voters through Facebook, Google, Twitter etc. and will contribute 35% of total spends compared with 20% in 2014, according to Tanmay Mohanty, group CEO of Zenith India, a media buying firm.