THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: With many film stars in the fray, the election monitoring authorities are quite confused whether their appearance on the mini-screen as part of their profession as actor or host would amount to electioneering. While the officials are planning to get a clarification from the Election Commission of India on this aspect, the stars are exploring legal advices.
Prominent stars in the fray, Mukesh and Jagadish, are having regular TV shows. Mukesh is appearing on TV shows ‘Badai Bungalow’ and ‘Sell Me the Answer’ while Jagadeesh is appearing in ‘Comedy Express’.
Election department sources said as per the existing norms appearance of candidates on the electronic media during the campaign period needs to be considered as campaigning. Media certification and monitoring committees are responsible to detect any violations in this regard.
“It is a really confusing situation; the existing guidelines, based on a Supreme Court judgement, say that that any appearance of a candidate on the electronic media needs to be considered as part of the campaign and accounted towards campaign expense,” said an election department official.
“Hence we would have to obtain clarification from the Election Commission on whether the regular TV shows of actors or hosts after filing nomination need to be considered as campaign.”
Mukesh, who is contesting from Kollam, said that he would be seeking a legal opinion on whether his appearance in regular TV shows after filing nominations would have any restrictions. Jagadish could not be reached for comment.
