Since the candidate cannot do all this work himself, they have entrusted the task to the person and company that does the related work, for which he is spending thousands of rupees.

With only a month and a week left for the House of Representatives elections, the internet and social media platforms are starting to fill up with candidates' campaigns. They are providing various content through their social media platforms. They are doing all this to attract voters in their constituencies. Since the candidates themselves cannot do all this work, they have entrusted the task to individuals and companies to do this work, for which they are spending thousands of rupees. Some are even spending up to 20,000 rupees per post. An IT company based in Pokhara has told Kantipur that it has been entrusted with spreading the agenda of candidates from Gulmi, Butwal and Biratnagar through Facebook, TikTok and Instagram. The company has said that it is working to make field videos attractive by asking the client (candidate) to make them available to the mobile phones of people with a certain geography, age and interest.

According to the company's content designer Rururara (name changed), since candidates do not have time to keep updating social media while walking in the field, they take care of all the digital management.

'Candidates who spend between Rs 1,200 and Rs 20,000 per post on boosting are our clients,' he said. 'After it came out that a leader's Facebook post had paid likes and paid reactions, the demand from clients has increased that they want Nepali likes.'

Berry Technology Pvt. Ltd., a unit in the digital market, has launched an election campaign management system called 'My Campaign.com'. According to the company's director, Subin Hachethu, from this platform, candidates can do all the work like voter management, team management, social media campaigning and SMS campaigning in one place.

The Election Commission has stated that it is monitoring all these activities and has increased its surveillance using monitoring tools. According to the Commission's Assistant Spokesperson Kul Bahadur GC, the Commission is regularly monitoring advertisements and election activities on social media through software such as 'E-Monitor Plus'.

He said that 'boosting' done by spending dollars on social media will also be included within the spending limit set by the Commission. 'Although it is a bit complicated to calculate such technical expenses, the Commission's IT experts are studying it,' he said. 'Once the data is ready, such expenses will be analyzed and if they are found to be contrary to the limits set by the Commission and the election code of conduct, they will be brought under the ambit of action.'

The Cyber ​​Bureau of the Nepal Police is playing a leading role in tracking the expenses happening invisibly on digital media and the help of experts has also been taken, informed the Assistant Spokesperson GC.

Similarly, the trend of candidates increasing fake likes and comments by using bots or paying money is also increasing widely. He clarified that the Commission will consider this as a violation of the code of conduct. ‘The commission’s call center has started receiving complaints related to digital propaganda through other means,’ he said. ‘We have adopted a method of fact-checking and alerting people first, but if necessary, action will be taken.’