And the final speaker at the IAMCR 2025 conference in Singapore for today is Nisha Singh, whose focus is on negative online political advertisements in India, especially in the context of elections. Elections are critical to democratic processes, and enable the people to voice their concerns to politicians; they also educate the public about democratic and political processes and stimulate political discourse.
Advertising has long been central to election processes, but the rise of digital advertising has transformed this, and enabled new campaigning approaches; this is no different in India. The rapid uptake of social media in India has further accelerated this development, and enables parties to bypass media scrutiny in communicating directly with the people.
This also includes negative advertising, which can undermine public trust in political processes and increase toxicity in the political climate – especially also when paired with microtargeting processes. This is of significant concern in Indian politics.
This project explored how such political advertising is constructed in India, and what impact it has on Indian voters and political contests. Nisha selected a number of BJP and INC ads as they were released on YouTube (and shared across other social media platforms). BJP ads attacked the INC-led party coalition and its multiple leaders as confusing and unreliable, and highlighted past INC failures; INC ads attacked the corruption, kleptocracy, and lies of the BJP and its leader Narendra Modi. These were analysed for a number of key elements.
Ads were generally attention-grabbing, and impactful after one-time exposure; they were designed for viewers to engage and share the videos through their social media platforms; they stimulated expression in response to these ads; and they added further toxicity to the political atmosphere. By contrast, they did nothing to educate voters and help them in making their electoral decisions; and they contributed to an overall decline in the quality of political discourse in India.
There is a profound need to push back against such negative online advertising in order to foster more healthy democratic discourse in India, and this might require a strengthening of legislation too.
