GUWAHATI, June 10 � With less than a year for the next State Assembly polls and facing an aggressive BJP, the Assam Pradesh Congress Committee (APCC) has adopted a strategy to make use of the social media for attracting youths, who form the biggest segment of the voters.
Congress leaders told The Assam Tribune that the grand old party is desperate to win back the support of the young voters, who had opted for the BJP during last year�s Lok Sabha polls, enabling the saffron party to secure seven of the 14 parliamentary seats in the State.
�We are giving primary importance to the use of the social media, including Facebook and Twitter. Winning back the trust of the young electorate is a major target in the run-up to the 2016 Assembly elections. With this in mind, we have started a programme under which we have called upon people below 32 years of age with aptitude in the social media and the internet to join our party and act as observers in the booth level,� said a senior APCC member.
He said that the first initiative in this regard came from APCC president Anjan Dutta, who made an appeal through his Facebook account. �It secured instant response. We have received over 1,600 applications so far from highly educated youngsters across the State,� said the leader, adding that the party will now shortlist some of the applicants.
�At each constituency, we will deploy between two to six such youths who are experts in the internet and the social media. This will not only help us develop a profile of each booth, its voters and their problems, but facilitate the process of getting in touch with individual voters. Besides, this will act as the first step in developing a new line of leadership for the future,� he said.
It is noteworthy that the social media played a pivotal role in the success of the Narendra Modi-led BJP�s campaigning during the 2014 Lok Sabha polls.
In addition to enrolling social media experts, the APCC has also lined up a series of programmes to train its workers at the booth, block, district and State levels over the next few months. The party is planning to start a series of public relations exercises at the local level to �highlight the U-turns of the BJP� on various issues, which will include press conferences at each subdivision by spokespersons beginning from July 15.
Among other significant steps initiated by the APCC is the revamping of its �Tea Cell� and expanding it to a full-fledged department by including retired and former tea garden workers and starting public awareness events on the NRC update process.