Social media campaign gains importance in GHMC polls
With the process for filing nominations ending on Friday, candidates are leveraging various social media platforms to establish contact with the electorate
Hyderabad: Ahead of the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) elections, political parties are leaving no stone unturned to connect with voters during the 10-day campaign period. However, with the Covid-19 pandemic imposing restrictions on movement in many places, social media is assuming more significance than ever.
With the process for filing nominations ending on Friday, candidates are leveraging various social media platforms to establish contact with the electorate. All the key political parties have roped in social media teams to promote themselves while there are political consultants also to keep an eye on their digital campaigns. Advertisements and publicity via social media are claiming a top spot on expense charts as well.
Political leaders are also creating groups on WhatsApp and Facebook and are campaigning with help of their followers, who promote their profiles and activities.
Telangana Rashtra Samithi candidate Parupalli Anitha Dayakar Reddy, who is in the fray from the Saroornagar division, has been more active on social networking sites ever since the campaign started. She says it plays a major role in the results in elections.
“Though we were active on social media campaigning for the last election as well, this year, it has intensified since we had to cut down direct interactions with voters due to physical distancing norms. We are appealing through various social media sites including WhatsApp and YouTube. A dedicated team has been assigned to work on this,” she says.
Krishank, the Social Media Convenor of TRS says receiving direct feedback from people is one of the pros of campaigning via social media.
“Social media helps in countering fake news, which is crucial especially during the time of elections. While positive content has to be pushed, simultaneously wrong narratives have to be exposed. Step by step our platforms change. We have a group of volunteers working relentlessly. Apart from Twitter, it is the era of WhatsApp. We have taken a list from corporators and MLAs, we made sure they have their WhatsApp groups and we are personally scrutinizing the content,” he added.
Youngsters are largely being involved in the social media campaigns to promote the profiles and activities of the candidates.
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