Shah for effective, aggressive social media campaign in Bengal

Stressing on an "attractive", "effective " and "aggressive" social media campaign in West Bengal ahead of next year's general election, BJP President Amit Shah on Wednesday said there was a need to ensure messages should were spread in Bengali instead of English on tools like Facebook, Twitter and Whatsapp.

The BJP chief, now on a two-day visit to the state, called for micro-planning, and emphasised on data storage and research as he charted out a strategy to strengthen the social media campaign with the objective of bringing "poribartan" (change) in Bengal.

"The present nature of social media campaign (in Bengal) would no longer be useful for reaching out to a large number of people and spreading our messages to the bottom (of the pyramid). We have to be active and aggressive with our social media team at the local level in order to bring change in the state," Shah said.

Several election analyses had pointed out significant contribution of social media to the victory of Bhartiya Janata Party under Narendra Modi's leadership in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls, he said.

According to him, social media campaign would play a crucial role in forming public opinion in favour of BJP in the ensuing elections.

"Social media campaign has to be effective and attractive. For this, micro planning is required. Continuous review of the planning would also be essential to make the programme more effective," he said.

According to him, data storage and research are also important in order to reach out to the masses.

"We must have a research team which will concentrate on making a comparative data on Bengal's situation vis-a-vis situation of BJP-ruled states. Comparative data should be based on different issues including law and order situation," he said during an interaction with the party's state social media team.

Elaborating on his theme, he said: "Firstly, our activists must be updated through the research and by accessing the data. Secondly, the data and research output must flow to the bottom through our internal communications. It would make a cumulative effect. Leaders have to go to villages in order to strengthen the local level social media team."

"Social media messages or campaign must be in Bengali so that marginalised people can understand," he added.

He also urged the party activists to share the positives of BJP-ruled states with the people of Bengal.

"For instance, if you find people of a particular village deprived of drinking water facilities, they should be made aware of the fact that drinking water is available in every village of Gujarat or Madhya Pradesh," he said.

Shah also said Bengal's people must be made aware of the fact that "the assembly elections in Gujarat were violence-free and people in Chhattisgarh do not buy construction materials from any syndicate".

"Then, people will start realising the need for BJP government in Bengal," he added.

--IANS

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