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Scan for outdated or missing drivers - takes under a minuteDriver Scan →Clear out junk files and repair common Windows errorsFree Scan →Fix the driver behind crashes, sound loss and screen glitchesFind Drivers →A four-part investigation published in March 2022 estimated that BJP-linked advertisers paid less per million Facebook and Instagram views than Congress-linked advertisers across most of the Indian elections it examined. The Reporters’ Collective and ad.watch described the result as an “unfair advantage,” but the evidence does not prove that Meta deliberately set out to favor the BJP or that Facebook determined any election result.
What the investigation studied
The Reporters’ Collective and ad.watch analyzed more than 536,000 political advertisements in Meta’s transparency database and API. The dataset covered February 2019 through November 2020, including India’s 2019 Lok Sabha election and nine state assembly elections. The series focused on advertisers that spent more than ₹5 lakh and was published in four parts covering ad pricing, BJP-linked “ghost” and surrogate advertisers, advertising associated with Reliance and New Emerging World of Journalism (NEWJ), and the role of engagement and polarisation in delivery costs.
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The researchers calculated costs from the spending and impression ranges displayed in Meta’s Ad Library. Because the library reports ranges rather than exact invoices or view counts, they used the midpoints of available ranges and excluded some incomplete or open-ended records. The results are therefore aggregate estimates, not evidence of a specific secret discount offered to a political party.
The Reporters’ Collective’s project page and Scroll.in’s summary describe the dataset and series.
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What the reported price gap was
Across the analyzed data, BJP-associated advertisers were estimated to have paid an average of ₹39,552 per million views. Congress-associated advertisers paid ₹52,150 per million views—nearly 32% more. The BJP-linked rate was lower in nine of the ten elections in the comparison, although Maharashtra was reported as an exception in which Congress obtained the lower average rate.
| Comparison | Estimated cost per million views |
|---|---|
| BJP-associated advertisers, overall | ₹39,552 |
| Congress-associated advertisers, overall | ₹52,150 |
| 2019 national campaign: BJP and candidates | ₹61,584 |
| 2019 national campaign: Congress | ₹66,250 |
| 2020 Delhi election: BJP | ₹35,596 |
| 2020 Delhi election: Congress | ₹39,909 |
| 2020 Delhi election: Aam Aadmi Party | ₹64,173 |
The investigation also reported more than ₹104.1 million in spending by the BJP and its affiliates, compared with ₹64.4 million by Congress and its affiliates. These figures and the price comparisons come from researchers’ estimates based on Ad Library ranges; they should not be read as exact transaction prices. Al Jazeera’s analysis explains the calculations and their limitations.
How Meta’s auction could produce different prices
Meta generally does not sell every impression at a fixed political rate. Its advertising system runs an auction in which delivery depends on factors such as the estimated value of reaching an audience, the ad’s predicted relevance and the likelihood that users will engage. Meta does not publicly disclose the precise formula or the weighting of each factor.
An ad that attracts more clicks, comments, reactions or other interaction can receive more delivery for the same budget, reducing its effective cost per impression. The investigation argued that highly emotional or polarising political content may generate those signals and therefore travel more cheaply. Al Jazeera’s related reporting presents that explanation.
That is a mechanism-based interpretation, not proof of partisan intent. The observed gap could also reflect differences in audience targeting, creative quality, timing, campaign objectives, advertiser experience, geography, or the BJP’s larger digital organisation. The study was observational: it did not place identical BJP and Congress ads under identical conditions in a randomized experiment.
Ghost and surrogate advertisers
Official advertisers are pages or organisations that openly identify with a party or candidate. Surrogate advertisers are third parties that promote a party or political message without clearly disclosing the relationship. “Ghost” advertisers are apparently independent or anonymous pages whose political role or funding connection is concealed.
The Reporters’ Collective reported 34,884 advertisements from BJP-linked proxies, compared with about 3,130 from two Congress-linked surrogate advertisers. It estimated that the BJP-linked proxies generated roughly 1.3 billion views—almost as many as the BJP’s official advertisements.
Proxy advertising can expand a campaign’s apparent reach, separate negative claims from an official party brand, and make spending and responsibility harder to trace. It can also complicate legal spending limits and disclosure rules. Those risks do not mean every proxy ad was illegal, false or directly commissioned by a party; affiliation, platform-rule violations, breaches of Indian election law and the truth of an ad’s claims are separate questions.
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Reported differences in enforcement
The series said Facebook removed 687 pages and accounts linked to Congress but only one page and 14 accounts linked to the BJP during the period it examined. Those are figures reported by the investigation, not an independently adjudicated finding about identical violations.
Removal can result from coordinated inauthentic behaviour, undisclosed coordination, technical violations or other enforcement criteria—not necessarily from the political viewpoint expressed by an account. The key accountability question is whether comparable conduct was treated comparably and whether users could identify who paid for political communication.
Reliance, NEWJ and disputed examples
One report examined advertisements funded by Reliance and placed by New Emerging World of Journalism Limited (NEWJ), a subsidiary of Jio Platforms. The investigation described an ad about BJP MP Pragya Thakur that allegedly used a false headline about her acquittal in the Malegaon blast case. It also described an ad portraying Rahul Gandhi as calling Jaish-e-Mohammed founder Masood Azhar “ji” while, according to the report, omitting the sarcastic context.
These are allegations about particular advertisements and their presentation. They should not be generalized to all Reliance, NEWJ, BJP or surrogate advertising, and the named organisations’ responses matter when assessing each example. Scroll.in’s account sets out the examples and the investigators’ descriptions.
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Meta denied applying its policies differently according to political affiliation. In its India election statement, the company said political advertisers must complete an authorization process, ads must carry disclaimers, and the Ad Library retains political-ad information—including spending and impression ranges—for seven years.
Meta also said it can disable ads referred by India’s Election Commission when it finds violations of local law. Its coordinated-inauthentic-behaviour enforcement, the company said, targets deceptive behaviour rather than a party’s political reach or viewpoint. Meta did not specifically explain the different effective prices reported by Al Jazeera. Read the company’s statement at Meta’s India elections page.
Responses from political parties and election authorities
Al Jazeera reported that BJP spokesperson Anil Baluni and BJP information-technology and social-media head Amit Malviya did not answer the investigators’ questions. The Election Commission of India also did not respond despite repeated reminders. A non-response is not an admission, and the available coverage does not establish that Congress accepted every characterization in the series either.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.Why the findings matter for election fairness
Campaign-spending limits are intended to support a level electoral playing field. If one party consistently obtains more reach per rupee, the practical effect can differ even when all parties have nominal access to the same platform. Undisclosed third-party spending makes campaign finance harder to audit, while platform enforcement can function like a private regulatory system for political speech.
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The investigation discussed Section 171H of the Indian Penal Code in relation to unauthorized expenditure by political supporters and pointed to gaps concerning online platforms. Whether a particular advertisement breached that provision or any current election rule is a legal question requiring India-qualified advice; the series’ interpretation is not itself a court ruling.
What the evidence does—and does not—show
- It shows: a recurring difference in estimated cost per million views, extensive BJP-linked proxy activity as classified by the investigators, and a reported disparity in account removals.
- It suggests: an engagement-optimized auction and opaque enforcement can create unequal political reach without an explicit rule saying to favor one party.
- It does not show: that Meta employees intentionally rigged an election, that every BJP-linked surrogate ad was unlawful, or that Facebook caused a particular election result.
- Important limits: impressions are not unique voters, engagement can include outrage or opposition, party attribution for apparently independent pages can be uncertain, and the Ad Library may omit hidden, mislabeled or unclassified political advertising.
Did concerns continue in 2024?
Later evidence raises related questions but does not prove the 2022 pricing claim. Human Rights Watch summarized concerns about cheaper BJP rates and selective proxy enforcement. Separately, India Civil Watch International and Ekō submitted 22 political ads in several Indian languages during the 2024 election. The Guardian reported that Meta approved 14, and approved three more after minor changes; the submissions included hate speech, incitement, disinformation and AI-manipulated material. The researchers removed the ads before publication.
Meta said political advertisers must be authorized, follow its policies and comply with applicable law, and that AI-generated content could be reviewed and labeled. See the Human Rights Watch overview and The Guardian’s account of the 2024 test.
The most defensible conclusion
The March 2022 investigation did not establish that Facebook consciously chose the BJP. It documented estimated price differences and alleged uneven treatment of surrogate networks, then argued that Meta’s engagement-driven auction and opaque enforcement could produce an uneven political playing field. That is a serious accountability finding, but it remains an investigative and methodological conclusion—not a judicial determination of partisan intent or electoral causation.
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