Even before Modi, there was the Congress: Grand old party hits back with satirical social media campaign

“Even before Modiji got his wisdom teeth, Nehru started work on ISRO,” read one of the several posters being widely being circulated on social media under the banner of Congress' achievements in 60 years.

“When Modiji left his wife and ran away from home, Indiraji had conducted first nuclear test,” read another one.

“When Modiji was playing gilli-danda, India had built dams like Bhakra and Rihand.”

This satirical social media campaign, comprising of 10 posters, draws comparisons of Congress' achievements with Prime Minister Narendra Modi who has repeatedly made jibes at the grand old party for not pursuing the development agenda in the last 60 years.

Ever since BJP formed the government in 2014, these questions continued to circulate widely on various social media platforms. Not just the Right wing trolls, even the prime minister had repeatedly said that only if the Congress had followed the development agenda, things would have been different today.

After the formation of his government, these smear campaigns against Congress' 60-year-rule continued to go viral with many falling into the trap of believing that the grand old party had done absolutely nothing since the Independence.

Only Congress was to be blamed for its inability to communicate with the masses through counter-campaigns. Meanwhile, the BJP succeeded in building a narrative that said that development was the last of Congress' priorities over the last 60 years.

Worried by this onslaught of negative social media campaigns, the Congress finally woke up from its slumber and overhauled the entire social media team with Divya Spandana being given the responsibility to head it.

The central government's faulty economic policies have come to the Congress' rescue and the narrative has begun to change as is being witnessed in Gujarat. Several of Congress' quirky campaigns have taken the social media by a storm.

This has even got BJP President Amit Shah worried. He warned his cadres about the misinformation being spread on social media at a recent party meeting.

Many believe that much of the credit goes to the party's newly constituted social media team that has been able to create campaigns that have hit the right chord with social media users.

While Catch could not verify the source of this campaign, a source in the Congress' social media team said that it wasn't an official campaign while underlining that nothing is official or unofficial about such campaigns.

“During the recent garba festival in Gujarat, people could be seen dancing to the tunes of several songs that ridiculed the government's development agenda. It was not official but a spontaneous campaign by the people who no longer trust the false promises of the Modi government,” said the party's social media advisor on the request of anonymity.

Also read: Gujarat polls: How Congress has made BJP face the music this Navratri

The social media advisor went on to add how several messages questioning Congress' achievements in the last 60 years were being circulated on various platforms to fool people. “This is a spontaneous response to that. I am happy that people are taking notice of it,” he said.

Edited by Jhinuk Sen