A state-level Media Certification and Monitoring Committee (MCMC) meeting, under the chairmanship of Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) Nagaland V Shashank Shekhar IAS was held in his office chamber on 27 January to monitor the pre-certification of political advertisements, paid news, social media, etc.

The CEO informed the state-level media committee and district-level committee to take responsibility of their powers and function and also examine the norms and procedures according to the ECI guidelines, the APRO CEO informed.

All registered national and state political parties and candidates contesting for the election must apply for pre-certification of political advertisement not later than three days prior to the date of the proposed commencement of the telecast of the advertisement.

On the timeline to submit an application for certification, the CEO also mentioned that in case of any other person or unregistered political parties, it should be not later than seven days prior to the date of the telecast.

The committee discussed and agreed to organise a workshop on monitoring of electronic and social media including print media with regard to the forthcoming general election scheduled on 27 February.

During the meeting, it was also decided that the committee would meet political parties from time to time with regard to paid news.

The meeting was attended by additional CEO Ruokuovituo Khezhie; Joint Chief Electoral Officer Sharon Longchari, NCS; Additional Director of I&PR, Dzuvinuo Theunuo; KPC President Alice Yhoshu; PIB Assistant Director K Sonikumar Singh; and representatives from AIR, Kohima, IT department and others.