No question of cutting ties unless Facebook is proved guilty: CEC Rawat

20 million Indians become first-time voters every year

Chief Election Commissioner O P Rawat on Friday said the poll panel would continue to have an association with Facebook, until the latter was proved guilty of any misconduct or impropriety.

After the regular election commission meeting, which is held among the three election commissioners every Tuesday and Friday, officials were asked to find out if there was anything amiss in relation with Facebook. Officials are supposed to present a report to the three-member commission at the next meeting on Tuesday.

Officials said thus far they had not found any risk associated with Facebook, which has come under the scanner for allegedly sharing its users’ data with British firm Cambridge Analytica (CA).

Rawat said the commission must harness the potential of social media to reach voters. He also denied sharing any voters’ data with Facebook.

EC tied up with Facebook on June 28, 2017, to launch a nationwide campaign to enroll first-time voters from July 1. It was replicating the experience of chief electoral officers, who had used the social media for enrolling new voters between 2016 and 2017. 

“With over 180 million people in India on Facebook, the “Register Now” button is designed to encourage Indian citizens to register themselves with ECI. On July 1, a notification of the voter registration reminder will be sent to people on Facebook in India who are eligible to vote. The reminder will be sent out in 13 languages – English, Hindi, Gujarati, Tamil, Malayalam, Kannada, Punjabi, Bengali, Urdu, Assamese, Marathi and Odia,” the Commission had announced.

After clicking the ‘Register Now’ button on Facebook, users were re-directed to National Voters’ Services Portal for registration. Though the EC never disclosed the number of voters who registered themselves through Facebook, its official said the number was “minuscule”. 

A few months after the partnership was announced, Alex Hardiman, director (news products), Facebook, spoke about the partnership at the Hindustan Times Leadership Summit in New Delhi. “We don’t have information on the number of people who enrolled. We have increased the team more than two folds to 250 people. They are focused specifically on these types of issues. I would expect a lot more partnerships,” she was quoted as saying. “We are making sure that we could do everything to restore trust in Facebook and high quality news and the electoral process.”

According to the EC data, about 20 million people turn 18 years old and become first-time voters every year. The EC estimates that there are over 62 million people falling in the age group of 15 to 17 years.

Cambridge Analytica is facing an inquiry for harvesting Facebook data and influencing the outcome of the 2016 US Presidential Elections.