By Abhishek Kumar

[Trigger Warning: Violent and graphic content]

As India gears up for the general elections 2024, the polling for which is to be held in seven phases from April 19 to June 1, Meta-owned social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram have become a battlefield for political advertisements. Consequently, the focus has also increasingly shifted to the policies of these platforms and their subsequent enforcement.

Political parties in India are known to invest significant financial resources in online advertising in their efforts to capture the voters’ attention. In just the last three months, the expenditure on political advertising has reportedly reached Rs 102.7 crores with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leading in this expenditure, having officially spent over Rs 37 crore in online advertisements alone. This figure is 300 times more than what the main opposition party spent.

Amidst this extensive digital campaign, we found that a Facebook page named “MemeXpress“ has invested over Rs 1 crore in political advertisements, mainly targeting opposition parties while promoting the BJP. According to the Meta Ad Library, the page was created on 12 December 2023 and has already published more than 310 political advertisements so far. Furthermore, our investigation found that four of these ads contain the video of the murder of Atiq Ahmed, a former one-time MP, five-time MLA and accused in multiple cases, which clearly violate Meta’s advertising standards against sensational and excessively violent content.

Note: Due to the excessive violence depicted in the content, we have blurred part of the video

The advertisements are captioned, “Just one bulldozer is needed in Bengal; all the stubborn Shahjahans will fall in line.” The upper half of the ad displays a video of the attack on Atiq Ahmed which caused his death, with the text “Criminals in UP” superimposed. Meanwhile, the lower half features a video of Shahjahan Sheikh, the primary accused in the violence in Sandeshkhali, West Bengal, being arrested and brought to Basirhat Court. The text in the lower segment reads “Criminals in West Bengal”.

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