Campaign ad surprise: Where the BJP spends
TLDR: We all know that the BJP are the biggest spenders on digital ads–and by a mile. The real surprise is where the party spends–not on states where it’s weak but where it is already the strongest. Why is that?
Written by: Election editor Chirag Chinnappa. Infographics by Sharath Ravishankar and News editor Nirmal Bhansali. Sharath is a Bangalore-based information designer and illustrator. Check his work out @shirtshanks
Digital campaigns are all about making the most of a finite resource, that is money. We assume that a political party will put all its moolah on closely-competitive constituencies—or those that are harder to win. Actually, not. We look at data of the BJP’s Google ad spends to explain why.
A look back: Last month, the BJP blew almost Rs 300 million on Google Ads. To give you an idea of the size of that spend, the party spent less than half—Rs 123 million—over a four-month period before the 2019 elections.
The really interesting bit: is not ‘how much’—which is what everyone is fixated on—but *where*.
Heatmap #1: This is data from the Google Ads Transparency Centre report. It shows the BJP’s ad spends across the country over 30 days (Jan 29 to Feb 28). The #1 state targeted: Uttar Pradesh—followed by Bihar, Maharashtra, Odisha, and Gujarat. Not at the top of the list: South India—with the sole exception of Karnataka. Jammu & Kashmir is darkened because of the unavailability of data.
But, but, but: Why is the BJP spending the most of its ad money on states it already has sewn up—like Uttar Pradesh or Gujarat. These are a done deal. Why not go after voters who actually need to be wooed—in states like Tamil Nadu, Jharkhand, or Telangana. This, especially if it wants to achieve its lofty “char sau paar” target.
Point to note: Political scientist Nalin Mehta tracked the rallies of Rahul Gandhi during the election—which showed a similar pattern: in UP, Modi addressed 31 rallies (13,455 km) compared to Gandhi’s 12 (6,564 km). Gandhi, “largely travelled more than Modi to states where Congress already seemed strong: Kerala, Karnataka, Punjab, Rajasthan.”
Chart #2: shows a very similar pattern in the BJP’s digital ad strategy in the twelve months leading up to the 2019 elections. The party spent the most on the states it swept.
Cart & horse question: The Hindu looked at a similar pattern in Facebook spends for 2019 and concluded “there is a direct correlation between electoral success and online ad spend.” It also notes that the party was the biggest spender on online ads in the states where the BJP won all seats. The cause-effect assumption is that the BJP won because it spent more on ads.
But as we can see from Heatmap #1—with January 2024 data—the party already has the biggest ad budgets for states it knows it is going to win–like Uttar Pradesh.
Point to note: Also notable in the 2019 Facebook data: “While the BJP pushed ads in English and Hindi, the Congress had at least 100 ads each in Kannada, Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam and Bengali.” Again, it shows BJP sticking to the part of the country it mostly owns—the Hindi Belt.
Explaining the skew: So why does the party spend the most on ‘safe’ states? Previous studies have pointed to a similar pattern in spending by Member of Parliaments–who favour villages that have voted for them in the greatest numbers. They don’t use their parliamentary funds on “competitive” villages—wooing swing voters.
In this case, the reason is straightforward: Politicians are expected to “reward” the voters and communities who supported them. However, rewarding a person for their support is not the same as spending money wooing a voter who is very likely to support you.
Anatomy of a big win: One possible answer lies in zooming into these states—which may seem ‘safe’ in a bird’s eye view. But each contains competitive pockets—where certain pockets have to be secured to arrive at the intimidating total.
Enter, the “marginal constituency”: The focus of most campaigns is on these seats—where relatively small movements of votes can make the difference between winning and losing. The BJP has an enviable record of winning the great majority of ‘closely contested’ seats—most notably in ‘safe’ states like Uttar Pradesh and Bihar. Take for example the neighbouring constituencies of Amethi, Faizabad, and Sultanpur in Uttar Pradesh—which the BJP won by less than 70,000 votes.
In India’s First-Past-The-Post System: even small differences in vote share can lead to big differences in seat share. With the “right distribution" of vote share, it is possible for a party to get a significant lead in terms of seats, despite having a lower vote share. The BJP received only 37.4% of all votes in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections—but won 303 seats, or 55.8% of the Lok Sabha.
Key point to remember: The BJP has built its unbeatable voter base in specific parts within the country. So it makes even more sense to focus your votes on winning big in those strongholds—like UP, Bihar, and Gujarat.
The most paisa vasool: In marginal constituencies, parties gain the most from a large digital ad spend. Just peeling away a small number of ‘persuadable’ voters offers a big reward. In turn, chalking up those big numbers in Uttar Pradesh—which accounts for 80 seats—adds up to a big national victory. So why spend more money on ads in, say, Tamil on voters who are very unlikely to be persuaded–at least for now.
