Need to tackle social media pollution: CEC

CEC Rajiv Kumar calls for Graded Response Action Plan to combat social media pollution and protect fair elections.

Observing that social media platforms were not blocking or labelling easily detectable fakes, Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Rajiv Kumar on Friday (January 24, 2025) said that there was a need for Graded Response Action Plan (GRAP) to curb “social media pollution” just like in case of air pollution.

“The entire social media space is polluted. If we have environmental pollution outside, equally serious social media pollution we have inside. It needs anti-pollution measures,” Mr. Kumar said in his valedictory address at an international conference of Election Management Bodies (EBM) of 13 countries which also adopted a resolution the “Delhi Declaration 2025” reflecting collective commitment to uphold principles of free, fair, and inclusive elections.

The CEC said that business interest appears to be at work here (social media). It is like first spreading the disease and then selling medicines. The casualty is a fair election process and purity of democracy.

Asserting that social media companies need to introspect before it is “too late”, Mr. Kumar said: “Let the social media platforms, which have been instrumental in providing a critical space for free expression, especially to voices not heard, not be clouded by the shadows of fake, unverified and misleading narratives, disruptive by design”.

He said that social media algorithms are designed in a way that repeatedly presents content aligned with existing views, reinforcing a perspective without exposing the person to the other side of the argument. Algorithms can certainly prevent do that especially in case of detectable fakes.

“It is not enough to leave it to fact checkers to detect it. It is like allowing easily detectable fake to pass through and then leave it to organisations at receiving end, like the EMBs, to engage fact checkers and rescue themselves and the electoral process”, Mr. Kumar said.

The participating EMBs expressed shared concern over false narratives and misinformation on social media and resolved to form a working group to tackle it collectively.