A Major Political Party Is Spamming Thousands On Twitter Before The Biggest Day Of Indian Elections

The BJP, the party likely to win the Indian elections, is spamming everyone on Twitter with pleas to vote for Narendra Modi as the next prime minister.

If you tweeted the words "BJP," "Narendra Modi," "NaMO" or any variations of these words on Wednesday, April 16, chances are you were spammed by the BJP's official Twitter account.

The party's Twitter account, which has nearly 450,000 followers, generated thousands of automated responses to people who tweeted any of these words irrespective of whether they followed the account or not.

The autotweets urged people to vote for the BJP's prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi along with his Vine asking people to do the same.

April 17 is the biggest day of the month-long elections in India with a total of 121 constituencies voting.

While these elections have seen significant political campaigning on social media to influence young, urban Indians, the scale of this spamming exercise by the BJP is unprecedented.

This screenshot demonstrates the sheer volume of autotweets being sent by the BJP's account. Within five minutes of the last tweet, the account generated 40 more.

Obviously, people weren't too happy.

According to Twitter's official rules, accounts that engage in spamming may be permanently suspended. Two of the activities that constitute spamming are:

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