India’s Digital Poll Battle: Political Parties and Social Media in the 16th Lok Sabha Elections

Abstract

This article analyzes the use of social media platforms by select political parties (BJP, BSP, CPI(M), INC, NCP and AAP) during the campaign in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. The methodology of data collection for the study includes the content analysis of Twitter and Facebook postings on social media platforms by these political parties for a period of 67 days. The study attempts to understand and analyze the strategies adopted by the political parties to interact and communicate with the voters online. It finds that social media has emerged as a virtual site where major political issues have been raised and contested; social media campaign is not simply interactive, but is aggressive as well. While underlying the growing importance and impact of social media in political campaign, this study however observes that it has not been a game changer in the 16th Lok Sabha elections.

Keywords

Social media political parties Lok Sabha elections BJP INC AAP

With the advent of the Internet and its recent pervasiveness in every sphere of life, including politics, online has become an indispensable medium in election campaigns across the world. As a result, the Internet and social media tools, such as, Facebook (FB), Twitter, blogs and YouTube, have been added to the existing traditional tools. This new media ‘create and expand the new spaces through which we interact, play and even politicize ourselves’ (Lovink & Rash, 2013, p. 10).

The evolution of the new media has been quite steady. In the 1980s, ‘teledemocracy’ (Babeo, 1995, p. 1) was initiated in the United States (US) through interactive television programmes. In the 1990s, Internet became a channel for dissemination of political communication and some people started using it to learn about politics and political candidates. Due to its interactive design, it encouraged citizens’ participation in politics and soon became popular in democracies such as the US, the United Kingdom (UK), Australia, New Zealand, Malaysia, South Africa and others. The Internet offered potential ‘to revolutionize political activity far more profoundly than the telephone or television ever did, for unlike them it offers the possibility of direct two-way interaction between the citizens and politicians’ (Ferdinand, 2000, p. 1).

The advent of the new technology, it was claimed, would bring transparency in governance, which will lead to greater efficiency and then to greater democracy. Further, it would also bring the citizens together in the virtual forums restoring a more genuine, and more profound, form of deliberative democracy (Ferdinand, 2000, p. 6) and digitally mediated direct representation could provide a basis for a more dialogical and deliberative democracy: ‘…new digital technologies of mediation make possible more direct techniques of representation…serve to democratize representation by making it a more direct relationship’ (Coleman, 2005, p. 178). Grossman (1995) even talked about ‘electronic republic’.

It is true that ‘cost, volume, directionality, speed, targeting, and convergence’, theoretically, made the Internet as a democratizing tool (Stromer-Galley, 2000, p. 41). Cost of political campaign is certainly much cheaper on websites. Surely, targeted messaging has become easier with emails, Short Message Service (SMS), etc.; SMS and ‘missed calls’ are increasingly getting popular in Indian elections in recent years. As websites provide audio-visuals, pictures and texts in one place, political parties have found it handy to put all types of contents in one place.

No doubt, due to emergence of the Internet, the social media platforms have influenced the democratic politics globally. As Internet has inherent democratic characteristics, the digital communication becomes direct, transparent, participative, collaborative and accessible to all without any boundaries. But does the Internet offer increased democratic interaction? Not really: in electoral campaigns, two-way communication between political parties/candidates and the electorates using the Internet is rare (Baxter & Marcella, 2012; Baxter et al., 2013; Marcella, Baxter & Cheah, 2008). Use of email, survey/polls, web chats, bulletin/web boards by political parties, which are supposed to be effective tools of two-way communication, are rarely deployed.

Further, though digital communication networks may be credited by some for bringing into existence a new democratic society, there are certain limits on digital democracy ‘due to state and capitalist surveillance and control over digital media technology, as well as due to structural inequalities that lead to digital participation inequalities’ (Dahlberg, 2011, p. 867). Moreover, it is being increasingly used for negative campaigning disregarding democratic culture. However, ‘the flexible and contested development and experimentation with social media technologies can themselves be seen as democratic opportunities’ (Loader & Mercea, 2011, p. 760).

Political parties in the US, the UK, Australia and some countries in Europe, Africa, and Asia now extensively use social media in elections; the most strategic use of social media was witnessed in the 2008 and 2012 US Presidential elections. In this context, this article first explores how India’s political parties have used social media in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections to attract young voters, raise online donations and also recruit/mobilize volunteers/members for their respective parties; second, it classifies and analyzes the issues raised and contested by the political parties in social media through tweets and FB postings. Finally, on the basis of this analysis, it attempts to assess its present impact and future possibilities.

Elections Campaign: Traditional versus Online

Political analysts rightly predicted that the 2014 Lok Sabha elections was going to be ‘substantially mediatized’ as compared to the previous ones (Palshikar, 2014). However, while analyzing the trend in election campaigning in this election, it needs to be emphasized that traditional techniques were very much in place. For instance, as Modi’s campaign statistics show, he travelled/covered around 300,000 kilometre (km), which included 410 hours of air travel; addressed 437 public meetings in 25 states, 196 ‘Bharat Vijay’ rallies, 2,000 3D rallies, 4,000 ‘Chai pe Charcha’; and conducted two grand road shows in Varanasi and Vadodara (The Indian Express, 11 May 2014). All these are part of traditional style of campaigning which certainly had a gripping effect on the voter. Moreover, innovative use of electronic media converted the usual dull style of traditional campaigning into a visual spectacle.

Also, if one analyzes media expenditure of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), one can again see a huge tilt towards traditional campaigning. Though the BJP claims (Gurtoo, 2014) to have spent only 700 crores in the campaign, the expenditure was 5,000 crores (5 billion dollars) as per media reports (Varadarajan, 2014), which is close to Obama’s expenses in the Presidential elections. The break-up of this estimated cost of campaign is as follows: hoardings: 2,500 crores; print media: 500 crores; magazines: 150 crores; electronic media: 800–1,000 crores; the online and radio: 35 crores; and T20 world cup: 150 crore. This clearly shows how online expenditure was meagre and was less prioritized by the BJP. However, without getting into other aspects of traditional campaign, it would be useful to shift to social media which very quickly made inroads into the business of elections.

As the Internet has become the fastest medium for the dissemination of information, many political leaders find this new medium quite effective to reach out to a large number of voters. In 2014, India has had 814.59 million voters, out of which 23.16 million were in the age group of 18–19 years, comprising 2.8 per cent of the national electorate (Hindustan Times, 6 March 2014). They are also first-time voters, many of whom have been exposed to the social media platform in one way or the other. Therefore, keeping in mind the young generation’s reliance on social media for accessing information, political parties have now ventured into the space of social media to explore the possibilities of winning over the young electorate.

Interestingly, despite the boom in social media, state-level leadership of the Congress Party still prioritized traditional strategy of campaigning: ‘the Congress cannot afford to ignore traditional political mobilisation because it earns them permanent political support’ (Jog, 2013). Also, as the Congress has a large voter base in rural India, the party relied more on traditional techniques to connect with them. Hence, the Congress Party was not very active on social media. Thus, some political parties do still raise a few questions vis-à-vis social media. Does the use of the Internet result in ‘disintermediation’?² Do the ‘likes’ really convert into votes? Do they really convince the voters on party’s ideologies, etc.? Does the replacement of personal touch by the virtual or digital interaction serve politics better? Does social media bridge the gap between traditional and online election campaigns?

Such traditional versus online debates, however, did not deter political parties to go ahead with the new medium. Thus, they got armed with their own official websites, accounts on FB and Twitter, blogs and party TV channels on YouTube. Through the social media, they not only disseminated information about the party’s activities, election campaigns, news, etc., but also provided a common platform for voters to comment, suggest and share their views with the party. The digital age ‘has drastically transformed the method and style of political communication and mobilization’; though it is yet to be seen how much the new media will be able to alter the political environment, however, the political leaders are of the opinion that its use would definitely increase the citizens’ involvement in politics as well as ‘unleash the wave of democratization around the world’ (Fox & Ramos, 2012, p. 2).

Elections and Social Media: Use of Information Technology (IT)

Internet and Mobile Association of India (IAMAI) Chairman and Google India Managing Director (MD), Rajan Anandan, has estimated that India would achieve the target of 250 million Internet users and 130–140 million smartphone users by the end of 2014. As 40 per cent of registered voters in urban India are on the Internet, he has made interesting predictions: ‘This election the Internet will impact urban India. Next elections, it will not be urban India, it will be India’, as by 2018, India will have 600–700 million Internet users, half of them on broadband networks, and 300–400 million smartphone users (Anandan, 2014). The IAMAI and IMRB International report (The Hindu, 19 November 2014) revealed that there were 278 million Internet users in India in October 2014, out of which 177 million were urban and 101 million rural. Thus, the urban–rural gap clearly suggests the uneven spread of the Internet and the digital divide. The report makes another interesting finding: for nearly 93 per cent of the respondents in urban India, the primary use of Internet is search, followed by online communication and social networking; however, in rural India, entertainment is the primary reason for Internet usage, followed by communication and social networking. Thus, just not the extent of the spread but, more importantly, the very nature and purpose of its use raises doubts about the impact of the Internet on electoral process and outcome; Lokniti–Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS) study also make similar conclusions (Verma & Sardesai, 2014).

For political parties, even this extent of spread and nature of usage of digital media were considered significant.³ Realizing its potential, major political parties went for ‘digital marketing’ in the political arena; tech-savvy candidates from urban constituencies extensively used the social media platform to attract and influence the new generation of young and first-time voters.

A joint study conducted by the IRIS Knowledge Foundation and IAMAI on ‘Social Media and Lok Sabha Elections’ claimed that social media was likely to influence the election result for 160 seats out of 543. The study identified 160 ‘high impact’ seats/constituencies where at least 10 per cent of the population were FB users. It further observed that it was not

the number of fans or the number of likes and tweets that is going to determine the probability of winning of a certain candidate but the ability of the candidate to engage with the electorate by rising above the media clutter and by trying to get his or her message across to the voter directly. (IRIS Knowledge Foundation & IAMAI, 2013)

As Michael Cameron (Business Standard, 5 February 2014) concludes, the practical effect of social media can be seen in closely fought elections. Hence, in a close election fight, the candidates should invest early and heavily on social media to gain votes. This has proved true in the case of BJP’s prime ministerial candidate, Narendra Modi, who started his work on social media much earlier, immediately after 2009. Modi’s American-Indian supporters advised Modi to exploit social media for electoral mobilization taking cue from Obama’s 2008 victory (Khare, 2014, p. 198). Thus, Modi became a social media phenomenon before he became the prime ministerial candidate (Chopra, 2014).

Analyzing the websites of political parties and candidates in the 2003 and 2007 Scottish Parliamentary elections, Marcella et al. (2008) concluded that websites were used for dissemination of information; it was not a two-way medium and situation in the last four years has not changed, rather it has regressed in terms of information provision. Baxter, Marcella and Varfis (2011) have studied the use of the Internet in 2010 by Scotland’s political parties and candidates in the UK general election campaign. In this study, they were of the opinion that websites of political parties and candidates were extensively used for ‘information provision, income generation and recruitment of members and volunteers’; they did not use social media platforms for two-way information flow. The study also found that the candidates did not encourage online discussions and that only 35 per cent parties and 37 per cent candidates were using blogs, FB or Twitter for election campaigning. Baxter and Marcella (2012) confirmed that the use of Twitter, FB and blogs of the political parties as well as candidates was basically for one-way information flow and political parties as well as the candidates did not engage online with public for any policy-related objective debate.

No such extensive content-based study of the social media platforms of Indian political parties has been undertaken so far. This study is an attempt to analyze the new emerging political pattern of a country whose 100 million citizens are active on various social media platforms. The major objective of this study is to understand why, how and to what extent the major political parties use social media in election campaign, the ways and content of interaction between political parties and the voters and the impact of social media on voters as well as on political parties.

Methodology

The period for data collection of this study comprised of total 67 days starting with 7 March, the day on which elections were announced, and ending on 12 May 2014, the last day of polling. During this period, FB and Twitter accounts of five out of six national political parties, namely, the BJP, the Indian National Congress (INC), the Communist Party of India (Marxist) (CPI(M)), the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) and the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), were studied, leaving out the Communist Party of India (CPI) as it did not have any presence on social media. Besides this, one state party,⁴ namely, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), was included in analysis as this party had been very active on social media since the very beginning of its formation and in the subsequent Delhi assembly elections. As AAP, despite being a state party, contested as many as 432 Lok Sabha seats, the party data pertaining to national level have been taken up for analysis.

Daily postings (till midnight) on FB and Twitter were recorded. The data recorded included the number of postings and tweets which were thematically categorized. Every posting and tweet was analyzed to determine its nature based on media links and the language of the post. Facebook postings were also analyzed with regard to number of likes, comments and shares a particular posting had generated. Total number of retweets was also recorded party-wise every day. All the data were recorded, analyzed and tabulated using Microsoft Excel software.

Table 1.

Use of Social Media Tools by Political Parties in India

Political Party	Blog	Facebook	Google+	Google Hangout	Twitter	YouTube	Website
AAP	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
BJP		✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
BSP	✓	✓			✓		✓
CPI(M)		✓			✓	✓	✓
INC		✓	✓	✓	✓	✓	✓
NCP		✓		✓	✓	✓	✓

Source: Author.

The study is limited to five national political parties and one state party. The replies, comments, hash tags, etc., generated by postings and tweets have not been analyzed in this study in view of their vast number. Moreover, this study has also not factored in the use of social media by individual party candidates as their number was more than 8,000.

Presence of Political Parties on Social Media Platforms

The online presence of six political parties, namely, AAP, BJP, BSP, CPI(M), INC and NCP, is tabulated in Table 1. All the parties were using prominent social media tools such as FB and Twitter. In this study, a detailed analysis of FB posts and Twitter tweets has been conducted. Table 1 depicts the presence of political parties on various online platforms. Political parties such as AAP, BJP, INC and NCP had held Google Hangout sessions successfully to connect and communicate with voters. Except BSP, all the other parties under this study have YouTube channels.

Content Analysis of the Social Media Platforms Used by Political Parties

The political parties used social media platforms extensively. The analysis of data in the following sub-sections confirms the same. It is also observed that Twitter was used extensively compared to FB. Facebook posts as well as Twitter tweets of the six political parties have been classified and analyzed based on the following themes and parameters:

Election Campaigns: slogans, manifesto, list of party candidates with details, information on rallies/3D rallies, Google Hangout schedules.

Criticism: critical slogans, speeches, direct personal attacks on opponents, criticism of policies of rival political parties, accusation on poll violence, etc.

Policy and Governance: policy initiatives/announcements, reviews of policies undertaken, work status, relief work, promises for new schemes and programmes, infrastructure (buildings, roads, trains, etc.), openings of new institutions, forming of new committees/commissions, etc.

Party Organization: information for party workers, meetings, announcements, donations, memberships, volunteers, booth workers, etc.

Self-promotion: promotion of the party, leadership and candidate(s).

Voter Education: information related to voting, voters identity (ID) cards, electoral list.

Besides these thematic classification, the following parameters further explain the pattern of use of social media:

Retweets: tweets by the party candidates and others whom the party is following.

Media Links: web links, audio/video links, text links in the newspapers/magazines, YouTube links, etc.

Language/medium of postings and tweets: English, Hindi and regional languages.

Public Activity (for FB): the likes, comments and share data per FB post was analyzed.

Followers and Followings of political parties on their twitter accounts were compared.

FB Posts

Table 2 gives a comprehensive view of the political parties’ style of postings on FB. In the 67-days period, the six prominent political parties posted a combined total of 2,297 FB posts. AAP was the most active on FB with 610 posts, followed by CPI(M) (595), NCP (480), BJP (348), INC (257) and lastly, BSP (7). The data revealed that the most active political party, AAP, could not get more than four seats and the party on the fourth position, BJP, was able to secure 282 seats. If social media impacted the results, then it shows that quality rather than quantity matters on the social media and that a better-quality post was able to convince and influence the voters.

The BJP was very articulate on the social media. Its posts were very concise yet comprehensive, crisp, neat, focused and self-explanatory; thus, they were able to attract successfully the attention of the voter. This is supported by the fact that their posts received highest number (average 23,903.5) of likings in comparison with the posts of other parties (see Figure 1). If one observes AAP’s postings, though they are highest in number, they were mostly repetitive and comprised more retweets than original tweets. For example, take the incident of the Varanasi election campaign violence, the party posted many posts and images which were similar to each other and hence repetitive.

Categorization of Facebook Postings

The CPI(M) had posted highest number of ‘criticism’-related posts (226) on FB, followed by AAP (150), NCP (125), INC (92), BJP (59) and BSP (4). CPI(M) mostly criticized the working and policies of West Bengal Chief Minister, Ms Mamata Banerjee, and they also criticized BJP’s prime minister (PM) candidate for 2002 Gujarat riots. The party argued that BJP will divide the nation if it comes to power. Likewise, AAP’s criticism was hard-hitting. For example, an AAP posting on 15 March 2014 said:

Table 2.

Cross-party Analysis of FB Posts

Party	Criticism	Election Campaign	Party Related	Policy and Governance	Self-Promotion	Voter Education	Total Posts
AAP	150	313	73	30	43	1	610
BJP	59	218	39	26	2	4	348
BSP	4	2	0	1	0	0	7
CPI(M)	226	341	1	22	5	0	595
INC	92	107	0	50	8	0	257
NCP	125	217	4	120	9	5	480
Total	656	1,198	117	249	67	10	2,297

Source: Author.

Why did some sections of media lie abt Modi ji’s development? Would media now have the courage to tell the truth about Gujarat? Isn’t it true that 800 farmers committed suicide during Modi ji’s regime? Isn’t it true that there is huge corruption in Gujarat even 11 years after Modi ji took over? Isn’t it true that 60000 small industries closed during Modi ji’s regime?

In contrast, the BJP, which went on to win the elections, moderately criticized other parties in its postings. For instance, the BJP, in a posting on 22 April 2014, said: ‘To end the institutionalization of corruption, the only legacy of UPA govt., Vote for Modi, press the “Lotus” symbol.’ The BJP, which is ranked fifth in the criticism postings, was very positive in its approach, as evident by slogans like Achche Din Aane Wale Hain (Good times are ahead) and Ab Ki Bar Modi Sarkar (This time Modi government). The party wanted to project in social media that Modi government would be synonymous to good governance which will benefit all citizenry.

As compared to other parties, the CPI(M) appeared late (March 2014) on the social media but they posted highest number (341) of ‘election campaign’-related postings. Most of their postings were with images of their leaders and slogans. AAP is second in the rank with 313 postings, followed by BJP, NCP, INC and BSP.

Two parties, namely, the AAP and the BJP, posted 73 and 39 posts respectively for ‘party’-related activities. Other parties did not post much on this. Both the parties were very active in asking for online donations, membership and recruitment of volunteers. In a bid to portray its transparent functioning, AAP also posted acknowledgement posts for receiving even 100 rupees donation from people by giving name, address, etc.

While political parties were very active in wooing the electorate, they did not give much attention to ‘policy/governance’ issues. However, two parties, namely, the INC and the NCP, mentioned policy/governance-related issues in few of their postings. The INC tried to impress upon the voters by enlisting the achievements of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) regime. For example, the INC posting dated 19 March 2014 said: ‘The Food Security Act has ensured that 81 crore of our people get food grains at highly subsidised rates. For us, providing people the Right to Food is not an act of charity, but a fundamental responsibility.’ The NCP posted for many days about the progress of relief work for farmers whose crops were destroyed by a hailstorm. The INC also tried to convey what type of governance they would provide if they came to power.

AAP, being the new entrant and also having had 49 days of governance experience, exploited the social media platform to its maximum for ‘self-promotion’ as compared to other parties. However, the 49-days rule invited more criticism than praise. All the political activities were to woo voters young or old, educated or uneducated, male or female, but no political party tried to educate the voters about voting and election-related procedures using this platform.

Use of Media Links

Except for BSP, all the other five parties used media links to connect their audience to websites, online magazines, articles/write-ups, newspaper articles, YouTube videos and TV interviews, programme links, Google Hangout sessions, rallies and leaders images, webcast, etc., through their posts. AAP had given media links in 373 FB posts, followed by BJP (291), CPI(M) (178) and INC and NCP with 155 and 154 respectively (Table 3). BJP had given media links of Modi’s television interview and Doordarshan (DD) interview webcast in the FB posts. Such links attract the voters and leave a lasting impression. The BJP had also given links to all Modi’s 3D hologram rallies and to the Google Hangout sessions as well.

Table 3.

Use of Media Links in FB Posts

Party	FB Posts Having Media Links	Total Posts
AAP	373 (61.14%)	610
BJP	291 (83.62%)	348
BSP	0	7
CPI(M)	178 (29.91%)	595
INC	155 (60.31%)	257
NCP	154 (32.08%)	480
Total	1,151 (50.10%)	2,297

Source: Author.

Use of Language(s) for FB Postings

English was the language predominantly used by all the parties except NCP. Table 4 reveals that out of total 480 FB posts, NCP posted 421 bilingual (Marathi and English) and 48 posts only in Marathi language. Congress comes in the second position as it used Bangla, Marathi and Punjabi in only seven posts. The reason is very apparent; whenever the elections were in West Bengal, Maharashtra and Punjab, the party tried to reach regional voters through their language. BJP, who is always promoting the use of Hindi language, had posted only 42 Hindi posts out of total of its 348 FB postings, though its postings in Hindi was the highest as compared to other parties, such as, INC (35), CPI(M) (28) and AAP (22). However, from BJP, more number of Hindi postings was expected.

Table 4.

Use of Language(s) in FB Posts

Party	Only English	Only Hindi	Bilingual (English–Hindi)	Only Regional Language(s)	Total
AAP	526	22	62	0	610
BJP	288	42	18	0	348
BSP	2	5	0	0	7
CPI(M)	566	28	1	0	595
INC	213	35	2	7*	257
NCP	11	0	421**	48***	480
Total	1,606	132	504	55	2,297

Source: Author.

Notes: * 2 Bangla, 1 Marathi, 4 Punjabi; ** Marathi–English; *** Only Marathi.

Public Activity on FB Posts

Figures 1 and 2 detail the public activity of all the six political parties. AAP has the highest number of average postings per day (9.1), followed by CPI(M) (8.86), NCP (7.14), BJP (5.19), INC (3.74) and BSP (0.10). Though BJP is in the fourth position in average posting per day, they have the highest number of likes per post per day of around 23,903.5, followed by INC (21,782.37) and AAP (11,073.22). The data confirms that there is no correlation between postings per day and likes per post per day.

Figure 1.

Source: Author.

Figure 2.

Source: Author.

While analyzing BJP’s FB posts, it was observed that the party was very articulate and systematic in their posts. With less number of posts per day, they have generated highest liking per post. Therefore, the quality of their posts mattered over number. INC postings have generated highest comments, 1016.33 per post, followed by AAP (842.76) and BJP (617.31). Analysis of the comments was not done due to the fact they were huge in number. In order to spread the information, the sharing activity per post per day was also very high in case of AAP (2,369.7), followed by INC (1,150.3) and BJP (1,117.62).

Twitter Posts

Party-wise Twitter followers and followings were analyzed for 67 days of the study period. It was found that there was a steady increase in the numbers of followers for all the parties. AAP recorded the highest number of increase (>135,000), followed by BJP (>110,000), INC (>42,000), NCP (>8,500), CPI(M) (>495) and BSP (>132). In case of increase in following, two parties, namely, BJP and CPI(M), had no following; however, other parties have recorded increase in the case of followings as well (Table 5).

The analysis of a total 13,408 twitter posts was conducted and it was found that AAP, like on FB, topped the position in Twitter as well. AAP has the highest number of twitter postings (7,805), followed by INC (2,774), BJP (1,099), NCP (1,231), CPI(M) (472) and BSP (27). Along with original posts, the parties have posted retweets also. Again, the maximum number of retweets and original posts are by AAP: 4,871 and 2,944 respectively. BJP retained second position in retweets by 694 and in original posts, it is INC with 2,141 posts (Figure 3). In case of average posts and average retweets per day in Twitter, the AAP again scored the first position with 116.49 posts and 72.55 retweets posts, respectively (Figure 4). Here we can say that, unlike in FB, the data in Twitter can be correlated that who has large number of tweets and retweets has generated highest number of tweets and retweets per day.

Table 5.

Status of Followers and Followings on Twitter by Political Parties

Party	AAP	BJP	BSP	CPI(M)	INC	NCP
Followers
7 March 2014	544,000	3,79,000	369*	3,182*	136,000	13,000
12 May 2014	679,000(>1,35,000)	489,000(>1,10,000)	501(>132)	3677(>495)	178,000(>42,000)	21,500(>8,500)
Followings
7 March 2014	394	0	5*	0*	75	23
12 May 2014	455(>61)	0	6(>1)	0	156(>81)	25(>2)

Source: Author.

Note: * Data recorded on 12 April 2014.

Figure 3.

Source: Author.

Figure 4.

Source: Author.

Categorization of Twitter Postings

During the period of study, it was observed that AAP ruled on Twitter. The party had highest number of tweets (7,805) on the Twitter. While analyzing the tweets posted during these 67 days by all the six parties, it was found that AAP was ahead in all types of postings, except for voter education tweets. In criticism category of tweets, AAP posted 3,161 tweets, followed by 718 by INC, 330 by CPI(M), 296 by BJP, 250 by NCP and only 11 by BSP. Similarly, in the category of election campaign, AAP posted 3,084 tweets, followed by 1,293 by INC, 678 by NCP and 641 by BJP. AAP was way ahead in party-related posts by 335, in policy and governance by 523 and in self-promotion by 691. No party gave much attention to voter education category. Out of 13,408 posts, only 36 posts were for voter education. BJP, under this category, topped with 14 tweets, followed by AAP (11) (Table 6).

Use of Media Links

Different parties used variety of media in their Twitter posts, such as photos, cartoons, and YouTube links; text links such as magazines articles and newspaper articles; and TV programme links and rally clippings were also shared through vine. Media postings amount to 31.06 per cent of the total Twitter posts. And AAP ranked first in using media in its tweets (2,721), followed by INC (884), BJP (415) and NCP and CPI(M) with 120 and 25 respectively. BSP’s presence on the social media platforms was very limited and the party did not use media in its posts (Table 7).

Table 6.

Cross-party Analysis of Twitter Posts

Party	Criticism	Election Campaign	Party Related	Policy and Governance	Self Promotion	Voter Education	Total Posts
AAP	3,161	3,084	335	523	691	11	7,805
BJP	296	641	14	81	53	14	1,099
BSP	11	15	0	0	1	0	27
CPI(M)	330	42	3	94	3	0	472
INC	718	1,293	51	443	267	2	2,774
NCP	250	678	20	235	39	9	1,231
Total	4,766	5,753	423	1,376	1,054	36	13,408

Source: Author.

Table 7.

Use of Media Links in Twitter Posts

Party	Twitter Posts Having Media Links	Total Posts
AAP	2,721 (34.86%)	7,805
BJP	415 (37.76%)	1,099
BSP	0	27
CPI(M)	25 (5.29%)	472
INC	884 (31.86%)	2,774
NCP	120 (9.74%)	1,231
Total	4,165 (31.06%)	13,408

Source: Author.

Use of Language(s) for Twitter Posts

English language was predominantly used by all the parties with the exception of BSP, who, out of its 27 posts, used Hindi language in 26 posts. Apart from English and Hindi languages, INC used regional languages such as Bangla, Punjabi, Marathi and Gujarati in five tweets and NCP used Marathi in its 134 posts (Table 8).

Table 8.

Use of Language(s) in Twitter Posts

Party	Only English	Only Hindi	Bilingual (English–Hindi)	Only Regional Language(s)	Total
AAP	6,447	1,358	0	0	7,805
BJP	1,000	99	9	0	1,099
BSP	1	26	0	0	27
CPI(M)	415	57	0	0	472
INC	2,307	456	6	5*	2,774
NCP	1,089	0	8**	134***	1,231
Total	11,250	1,996	23	139	13,408

Source: Author.

Notes: * 2 Bangla, 1 Marathi, 1 Punjabi, 1 Gujarati; ** Marathi–English; *** Only Marathi.

Some Apprehensions and Questions

Being on Social Media Means Voting for a Wining Party?

It is difficult to ascertain whether those who were on social media voted in favour of any particular party or not. A study conducted by IAMAI and IRIS Knowledge Foundation (2013) on the impact of FB on the elections, identified, out of 543 constituencies, 160 as high impact, 67 as medium impact, 60 as low impact and 256 as no impact constituencies. They divided the levels of constituencies on the basis of the presence of voters on the social media in a particular constituency. They were of the opinion that ‘well executed social media campaign can swing votes by as much as 3–4%’. It can only be assumed that those on social media are young voters and they have voted for the winning party. However, this needs to be ascertained. This election has seen more than 66 per cent voter turnout. The rest of the eligible 34 per cent did not vote and 1 per cent chose NOTA (None of the Above). The question then is: whether there is any mechanism to find out how many of active users of social media did not cast their vote, out of the total electorate who opted not to vote and preferred NOTA?

Taking the research on ‘high impact constituencies’ further, Chakravarty (2014), in his study, analyzed the presence of winner and runner-up of these 160 high impact constituencies from 25 states and union territories by commuting the social media index⁵ of 320 candidates. He found that 71 per cent of the candidates had either no or minimal presence on the social media platforms. He further observed that 70 per cent of the winners from these high impact constituencies did not have any ‘meaningful social media presence’ (Chakravarty, 2014). Such type of data analysis corroborated that social media was not a game changer in this context. It did not help the winning candidates. His study further supported the argument that the losing candidates had significant presence on social media in comparison with the winners: ‘in constituencies that witnessed vibrant social media campaigns, a higher social media index did not correlate with the candidate’s ability to win’ (Chakravarty, 2014, p. 15).

Can ‘Likes’ and ‘Favorites’ Convert into Votes?

Very often, a question is raised whether ‘likes’ and ‘favorites’ on social media platform can be transformed into votes. In the 2009 elections, India had 70 million Internet users and approximately 10 million were on social media. BJP was the only party at that time which had presence on social media. At that time, the vote share of Congress was 119 million and BJP, 78 million. BJP, despite having social media presence, could not gain votes and Congress, which had hardly any presence on social media, won the elections. This strengthens the argument that the social media alone cannot influence; however, it could be one of the factors that influences the election results.

It needs to be emphasized here that there is no necessary correlation between posts and likes; higher number of posts does not always generate higher number of likes. For instance, BJP was able to generate highest likes with less number of posts as compared to AAP (Figures 1 and 2). But there may be a positive correlation between the number of likes and vote share, as claimed by Barclay, Pichandy, Venkat and Sudhakaran (2015), in their study on FB ‘like’ of Lok Sabha 2014 elections: ‘The number of “likes” that a party secured on its or its leader’s Facebook fan page was found to be a predictor of its vote share with 86.6% accuracy’ (p. 24). However, this was beyond the scope of the present study.

How Much is Virtual World Real?

Virtual world and real world may not always converge. For example, the BJP and the AAP were the main rival parties on social media platforms or, more precisely, in the virtual world. The AAP received enough media attention and was considered to be a major player/gainer of seats in the 2014 elections. However, in the real world, the elections outcome did not match the image created on the virtual arena; while the AAP was simply washed away, the BJP achieved a spectacular victory defying all predictions.

Is India Ready for Disintermediation in Political Environment?

Disintermediation simply means absence of mediation in any system. It is argued that with the coming of the Internet and digital media, the political actor can establish direct communication with the electorate, thereby greatly eliminating/minimizing the traditional role of various political intermediaries: digital media ‘looks to bypass state, corporate, political party, and lobby group interference in this individual–representative relationship’ (Dahlberg, 2011, p. 859). Thus, disintermediation may be perceived as a threat to democracy, as filtering by the democratic agencies, such as, media groups, journalists and pressure groups, is essential to democratic process. Those who overemphasize disintermediation miss out the emergence of a new generation of web intermediaries like websites, discussion forums, bloggers and FB groups, which are using various social media platforms to produce political contents on their own for public engagement.

A study (Parisi & Rega, 2011) on the FB activities of Italian politician Nichi Vendola and his online support group, ‘La Fabbrica di Nichi’, observes that the latter was much more effective than the leader himself. Such ‘spreader’ online groups effectively promote their leader’s personality, vision and message through audio/video, text, pictures, etc., on FB wall in the form of tagging, posting, sharing and commenting. Hence, though online medium has initiated the disintermediation process, it has simultaneously introduced the re-intermediation in the form of new generation of web intermediaries.

In the context of Indian politics, can a political party vanish between voter and candidate (Panda, 2013)? Is Indian politics ready for that? Can a candidate bypass the party and directly mobilize and interact with voters online? BJP’s PM candidate, Modi, directly connected with the voters not only by undertaking innovative traditional campaign but also taking the lead role through social media platforms, thus acquiring an image larger than the party. Hence, in a way, the preference of voters was Modi, rather the party; though it is another story that his victory ultimately helped the party. However, growing disintermediation may negatively impact parliamentary democracy as it undermines the pivotal role of political parties, encourages the growth of personality cult and questions the very foundation of political representation.

While acknowledging the success of Modi’s direct communication with the electorate by dismantling ‘old’ intermediaries to some extent, ‘new’ intermediaries like various online support groups of Modi and the BJP, and other political leaders and parties, actively promoted their leaders, parties and candidates. In a digital democracy, it is desirable to have both disintermediation and re-intermediation as ‘old and new intermediaries compete for citizens’ attention’ and disintermediation and re-intermediation have to be related to specific models of democracy and styles of citizenship’ (Edwards, 2006, p. 163).

Conclusion

Use of social media in political mobilization is catching up in India in a big way. As a result, discourse on democracy now grapples with new concepts like cyber-democracy, electronic republic, cyber-libertarianism, disintermediation and re-intermediation. Political scientists have started analyzing the impact of social media on democracy, raising serious research questions: Does digital media make democracy more participative than before? Does this medium bring the government and the people really closer? Does social media enhance citizen’s share in decision making? What is the actual impact of this new media on election outcome? Will it make the traditional tools of political mobilization obsolete? More researches are needed to answer these questions.

This study, focusing on the use of social media in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections campaign in India, agrees with Gomez’s (2013) observations on Malaysia’s 13th general elections that ‘social media campaign can only form one part of the media narrative. There are other narratives being formed by the mainstream print and broadcast media as well as paid advertising and direct-marketing…’. Modi’s media spectacle in this election certainly constituted the larger narrative. Traditional techniques were reinforced innovatively; both print and electronic media remained pervasive. Social media may not have been a game changer in the 16th general elections, but Indian political parties used it to attract voters, particularly the young and first-time voters. They used this medium to raise funds, connect with the electorate and mobilize/recruit volunteers; besides interacting, they also used social media to raise issues, attack their opponents and promote their own leadership. Social media has certainly made a huge splash and will continue to make inroads into the election campaign in the coming elections.

Footnotes

Notes

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