issue 300

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For any political mobilisation, leadership
plays a major role. The mobilisation
essentially happens in two parts, first part
is consensus mobilisation and second part
is action mobilisation. Consensus mobilisation
requires political party and political
leader to influence the identity and ideology
of people. Influencing identity and ideology
is a comparatively easy process to
understand. Prime Minister Mr. Narendra
Modi and BJP influenced people’s identity
and ideology by using the Hindutva agenda.
They also connected with common people
with the slogan, “Sab Ka Sath Sab Ka
Vikas.” Indian being majority Hindu nation
this process of developing people’s consensus
to Hindu ideology may have been
slightly easy. The game of politics is tough
one and it needs consistent efforts.
However, we have not seen any other
party’s consensus -building agenda equivalent
of Hindutva. Of course, some efforts
were made to build the Mahagatbandhan,
which failed to make any impact. The
efforts of Mahagatbandhan, Dalit-Muslim
union, Vanchit Bahujan, Aam Aadami,
Pasmanda etc. But they appeared fragmented
and none achieved the level of popularity
that Hindutva acquired.
Leader also plays an important role in
arousing emotions of injustice, anger and
hope. Every human being has a need to
change his circumstances. Mr. Modi used
the trump card of dynasty quite well. He
made sure people felt the injustice and neglect
by the Congress. He created the narrative
of them (dynasty) vs us (common person).
To further strengthen his position, he
flaunted his identity as Chaiwala. The common
person could relate to the image of
Chaiwala. He emphasised on damages and
corruption done by Congress. Mr. Modi
anyway has a charismatic personality and
he further enhanced his personality by his
power dressing. He called himself fakir (a
religious ascetic who lives solely on alms)
but made sure he looked good on screen.
His sense of managing his media presence
is indeed very evolved.
Mr. Modi made himself the indispensable
leader. He benefited from the efforts
put by RSS, over the years in building solidarity
amongst the Hindus. He claimed the
resources built by RSS over 70 years.
People didn’t see any option, as Rahul
Gandhi (or others) did not match the
charisma of Mr. Modi.
In fact, Rahul Gandhi did have a greater
advantage through his pedigree.
Unfortunately, he couldn’t use that to his
favour. BJP created a parallel campaign to
prove how useless Rahul Gandhi was. The
negative positioning campaign worked
successfully well. Congress had an opportunity
to rebuild the image of Rahul
Gandhi. However, enough efforts were not
made.
The agenda of injustice was the game
changer. Modi created an environment of
hope to create a better future for all.
However, the promises made by Modi did
not get fulfilled. He took a lot of erratic and
haphazard decisions. May that be demonetisation
or GST.
NEWS LITERATURE POLITICS FASHION ART & CULTURE KIDS RELIGION FILMS
Winning Indian elections
a critical analysis of the
tactics and strategies
However, he made sure he used right
frames (narratives) to convince people.
Despite facing heavy criticism from economists,
he managed to convince people why
his decision was right? He used the frame
of ending corruption and terrorism. He
sounded convincing to common people.
For any effective mobilisation, technology
plays an important role. Mr. Modi did
not shy away from spending millions of
rupees in running his social media campaign.
In fact, 2019 election is the most
expensive election in the history of India.
He systematically used media to influence
people’s minds and opinions. He also created
an environment of fear.
He created that fear environment for
multiple groups and at multiple levels. He
created the fear of Hindutva is in danger.
He created a fear of India being in danger
of being attacked by Pakistan. He created
the fear that if people don’t support him
then Congress may do greater harm to the
country. In this process many left-wing
groups felt the fear and threat. It’s not up to
me as an analyst to pass judgements. I am
just stating the facts.
As I discussed earlier developing consensus
of like-minded people is comparatively
easy than influencing people to take
actions. That action of joining the rallies,
working for the party, being influencers,
being part of social media campaigner etc.
and finally voting for BJP. From subscribing
to ideology to influencing
people to take action of casting
a vote is a long-driven
Dr Prerna Tambay
process.
It requires a lot of efforts
and well-designed strategies.
It requires special frames, we have seen the
frame of Hindutva, the frame of corruption,
Congress free India, chaiwala and chowkidar
were dominant. They did work well. To
influence people, political party must have
a great understanding of the target audience
/ network.
Modi divided his network into 3 primary
categories, population of poor people
(who voted maximum), middle income
group and youth. In 2014 he appealed to
the majority poor population. Where he
talked about their basic needs like toilets,
cooking gas, bank account etc. The hope of
good future mobilised that demographic to
bring Modi to power.
He has not been successful in fulfilling
the promises he made. In politics emotions
play an integral role. Specifically, in India
where basic value system revolves around
emotions. Modi made emotional appeal to
his voters, where he emphasised his inability
to clear the 70-year-old mess created by
Congress. When one compares damages of
70 years and progress of 5 years.
It sounds logical. Modi has a great talent
of appealing to people emotionally. May
that be the appeal to youth to vote for his
victory in Pulwama. He created a pseudo
atmosphere of victory over Pakistan. The
emotions of win over Pakistan has worked
in his favour. That indeed was the master
stroke. Again, that shows how he knew to
catch the pulse of people.
He has the capacity to form a connect
with people. He is a shrewd politician who
knows how to concentrate power in one
hand. He represented the whole party as
Modi. In country like ours, where we are
conscious of class and caste, he used both
these to his favour. He never engaged himself
in dialogue. He never believed in democratic
decisions. As though he knew Modi
is BJP and BJP is Modi. This victory
solely belongs to Modi.
In summary, leadership, frames
(stories you tell people), emotions,
understanding of demographics (networks)
and effective use of technology
can together create a winning formula.
Hope Congress and other parties
ponder over this success formula.
Unless the fragmented opposition manages
to build a consensus around a strong concept
countering Hindutva, BJP may get a
chance to rule for many years. After all, a
strong Opposition is very important for
democracy to survice. Hope, Mr. Modi
lives up to his promises, follows constitution
and practices secularism to make
minorities feel safe.
31-5-2019
23
Trump admin tearing down
hard-won civil rights: Clinton
New York : Former US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said
President Donald
Trump's administration
was tearing
down hard-won
civil rights".
"We've seen a
surge in hate crime
across America --
shootings and
arson at synagogues,
mosques
and
churches,
Americans targeted
because of their
race, religion or
sexual orientation," Clinton, the 2016 Democratic presidential nominee,
said while delivering the commencement address at the Hunter
College here on Wednesday.
"And instead of standing up against bigotry and white supremacy,
this administration has too often worked to tear down hard-won civil
rights." Clinton said the administration has "banned Muslims from
entering the country, ripped away protections for transgender
Americans, waged war on voting rights for people of colour, poor
people and young people".
Slamming the White House's hardline immigration policies,
Clinton pointed to the US' southern border with Mexico, where she
said "our government is tearing children from the arms of their parents"
and "locking them in cages". The former First Lady said that
over the past two years the US has seen "people wearing Nazi symbols
once again marching in American cities carrying torches and
chanting hate", and she recalled the 2017 white nationalist rally in
Charlottesville, Virginia, where a woman was killed.
She also responded to Special Counsel Robert Mueller's rare public
statement earlier on Wednesday, where he addressed his team's
findings in the Russia probe, saying that charging the President was
not an option his office could consider in its investigation but that "if
we had had confidence that the President clearly did not commit a
crime, we would have said so".
Chinese database leaks 42.5mn
records from dating apps
Beijing : As many as 42.5 million records of users of different
dating apps were
found in a single
Chinese database that
doesnt have a password
protection, a
security researcher
has said.
Jeremiah Fowler
on May 25 discovered
a non password protected
Elastic database
that was clearly
associated with dating
apps based on the
names of the folders.
"The IP address is located on a US server and a majority of the
users appear to be Americans based on their user IP and geo-locations.
I also noticed Chinese text inside the database," Fowler wrote
in Security Discovery on Tuesday. The security researcher believed
the database's owner was also Chinese. "Upon further investigation I
was able to identify dating apps available online with the same names
as those in the database. What really struck me as odd was that
despite all of them using the same database, they claim to be developed
by separate companies or individuals that do not seem to match
up with each other," Fowler added. The database, however, did not
include financial information. According to the CyberScoop, Fowler
wasn't implicating the developers behind the apps of doing anything
nefarious, the fact that they'd gone to such lengths to conceal their
identities was inherently suspicious.
Muslim worshipper injured
in UK hit-and-run
London : A Muslim worshipper was seriously injured in a hitand-run
crash after coming out of a mosque in the UK city of
Leicester, the media reported on Thursday.
The man, in his 40s, had left Masjid At-Taqwa mosque when he
was struck, the BBC reported. The mosque said he had been hit by a
car after participating in Taraweeh - prayers made during the month
of Ramadan. Leicestershire Police said the man was in a stable condition
and it was not treating the crash as terror-related.
A bid to track down the car, which "failed to stop at the scene", is
ongoing, police added.