MCMC nod must for advts in print media

Vijayawada: The Election Commission issued guidelines to the political parties not to issue advertisements in the print media on the polling day and a day before the polling day without the prior permission of the Media Certification Monitoring Committee (MCMC) at the district-level and the state-level, said commissioner of information and public relations T Vijay Kumar Reddy.

He said in a statement here on Tuesday that the Election Commission had observed that there were misleading advertisements in the print media on several instances during the last general elections. Since there would be little time to give clarification or condemnation for the candidates or the political parties in the last minute, that would cause impediment to the election process. The Election Commission would take suitable action under the Article 324 of the Constitution to prevent such hateful or misleading advertisements.

Vijaya Kumar Reddy made it clear no candidate or the political party should publish any advertisements without prior clearance from the MCMC on the polling day or a day before the polling day. The district-level and the state-level MCMCs are alerted to go through and clear the advertisements immediately and give permission to the candidates or the political parties.

The commissioner appealed to the candidates and the print media to cooperate with the Election Commission by publishing the advertisements which were duly cleared by the MCMCs.