Digital spend by political parties may double this election season

Political parties in India are spending sizable sums of money on digital campaigns, with both major parties releasing Bollywood-style music videos in the run-up to elections.

New Delhi: Online advertising expenditure by political parties is likely to double to Rs 400-500 crore this Lok Sabha election compared to 2014, riding on the growing smartphone penetration and cheaper Internet packs, experts said.

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leads the pack in advertising spend in the digital space, they said.

"The total advertising expenditure on election campaigns could be between Rs 2,500-3,000 crore in the 2019 general elections," said Ashish Bhasin, CEO- Greater South, Dentsu Aegis Network.

Of this, ad spends on the social media and other digital platforms could be around Rs 500 crore, Bhasin, who is also the company's chairman and CEO-India, said.

Bhasin said the overall expenditure also includes the manpower cost for campaigning, but not the spends on advertising government schemes and programmes.

According to Google's Political Advertising Transparency Report, the total spend on its various digital segments surpassed Rs 86,311,600 since February 19 this year.

A similar report by Facebook showed such expenditure at Rs 121,845,456 for 61,248 ads.

According to Indian fact-checker AltNews, political ads on Facebook in the first two weeks of March amounted to more than 3.5 million US dollars.

Current Prime Minister Narendra Modi's "I too am a watchman" slogan-turned-campaign song, has more than a million views on YouTube.

The 2019 general election is being held in seven phases across the country, from April 11 to May 19. The results will be announced on May 23.