"Paid news" detected in favour of 5 more candidates in Delhi

Delhi's Election Commission has detected instances of "paid news" relating to five candidates in the run-up to assembly election and added expenditure in this regard in their poll expenses.
However, the Commission is yet to decide on the appeals of two Congress leaders including Revenue Minister Arvinder Singh and Sushil Gupta who have moved against the order of inclusion of amount spent on "paid news" in their poll expenses by the District Media Certification and Monitoring Committee (MCMC).
The district MCMC has passed an order to include Rs 24,407 and Rs 9,786 in the poll expenses of Singh and Gupta respectively. Singh is contesting from Gandhi Nagar while Gupta is a Congress candidate from Moti Nagar constituency.

"We have received appeals of both the Congress candidates and are in the process of analysing facts. Orders will be passed subsequently," said CEO Vijay Dev today.
The other five candidates against whom inclusion of amount has been passed are BJP candidates Neel Daman Khatri (Narela- Rs 17,500) and Jai Prakash (Sadar Bazar - Rs 4,893), BSP candidates Dheeraj Kumar Tokas (R K Puram - Rs 18,019) and Md Saleem Saify ( Nangloi - Rs 9,817).
60 complaints of paid news have been received by Delhi's Election office so far. In 19 cases, the CEO took suo motu cognisance of news stories published in the media.

Complaints were not found to be of paid news in eight cases, while in 28 cases notices were issued to candidates to submit their replies. Besides, there are 24 cases where the Office of CEO is in process of issuing notices.
As far as action against electronic/print media is concerned for paid news, Dev said a detailed report would be sent to the Election Commission of India after the electoral process gets over.
"The EC will further interact with the Press Council of India and the appropriate broadcasting authority for action against media houses," added Dev.