Bengaluru: It’s the world of Facebook, Twitter and WhatsApp today and what better propaganda tools can there be for the BJP’s war room in Malleswaram, abuzz with activity at all times of day and night ?
Located close to the party's office in the locality, it has a good blend of people , from professionals to volunteers to techies, posting , tweeting and WhatsApping from as early as 8.30 am to midnight and sometimes even upto 2 am, making sure the BJP's voice is heard by everyone with a phone to his or her name.
While keeping tabs on social media for constant updates on news developments across the state, the cell has also been working actively for over six months now in creating WhatsApp groups. And the number created is a mind- boggling 20,000!
The job does not end, but actually begins there as these groups are active every moment, reaching out to people and sometimes even interacting with them.
The team of 40 in the war room works extensively on creating trends in favour of the BJP with an eye on the elite of society, who are more accustomed to using Twitter. Punchy and controversial tweets by rivals, Congress and JD(S) are used to create trends. When certain tweets go viral, there is celebration. And when the media latches on to certain trends it’s the icing on the cake, admits Mr Balaji Srinivas, state convener of the BJP social media cell.
The bulk of messages are predictably pro –BJP, talking of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s initiatives for Karnataka, the “failures and anti-farmer policies” of the Karnataka government, posters and videos.
The war room doesn’t forget to dish out tweets and posts on the BJP’s flagship initiatives like the Bhagya Lakshmi scheme under which the first girl child born to a family got a one lakh bond, the Sakala scheme aimed at delivering time-bound service, the World Kannada Summit and the first ever agriculture budget of the state.
With barely two days left for filing of nominations the war room is getting shriller and more vocal across the state, especially in Bengaluru with its 28 assembly constituencies.
“With about 2.5 crore people using mobile phones in the state, social media is a good way to reach out to the masses not just in urban areas but also rural ,” sums up Mr Srinivas.
