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[mackie192-blog]

Narendra Modi

As the largest ever democratic election takes place in India it is important to understand the different figures involved. One of which, and possibly the most important is that of Narendra Modi who is both the current Prime Minister and favourite to win the 2019 election. Modi’s figure is a major part of the Bharatiya Janata Party’s platform so why are they are doing this? And what are the many critics of this man?

 The strong man persona of Narender Modi has garnered much popular support within India. One such demonstration is the extremely large Facebook pages and groups which have sprung up to further their support for a leader they see as theirs. The appropriately named “WE SUPPORT NARENDRA MODI” page boasts an impressive 2.9 million people at the time of writing although that number is rapidly increasing. This enormous group treats their leader as a cult like figure, gifs of Modi litter the comment sections under positive almost propagandas post in favour of the current Prime Minister. The “WE SUPPORT NARENDRA MODI” group is one of many who disperse similar rhetoric and a quick search on Facebook will lead you to discovering many of the largest political groups on the platform. Some of these pages include “I Support Modi Ji and the BJP” and the simply named “Naredra Modi” which states “MODI FANS ONLY”. These pages demonstrate the gravity of Modi’s character and popular support within many sections of the Indian population.

These monstrous online communities all share a similarity in their threads. The many common themes and elements consist mainly of what would be considered a strong nationalist and traditionist identity in the West. Supporting my evaluation of these pages is the posting of religious figures which highlights Modi’s support and ideology of Hindi nationalism. This appears to be largely supported by the subsect of the populous who frequent groups like that of “WE SUPPORT NAREDRA MODI”. This highlights the culture from which his popularity derives from. Another reoccurring theme of pro Modi groups is the support for the military, which ranges from the harmless write, so and so phrases if you support the troops comment x phrase like and share excreta. Which also demonstrates that strength is valued by this community and the want for a strong leader and nation. These nationalist values hold many similarities to a populist western leader like that of Donald Trump or even more locally Pauline Hanson and Bob Katter. This to me shows that his charisma and        values are connect with a similar group of society. Overall the pages and groups highlight Modi’s popularity and his dedicated continuants who feel passionately about him.

Whilst there is a strong movement Pro BJP and Nerendra Modi there is an equally passionate counter movement. Just as there are many pages and groups which are aggressively anti the current prime minister but this critical sentiment is felt mainly on pro opposition pages. One such page this can be viewed is that of Rahul Gandhi the leader of the Indian national congress who is considered one of the major contenders for the 2019 election. Obviously the comments on his wall are considerably favourable of his policy and personality but his comment section is not solely reserved for praise there are frequent attacks on Modi and his identarian politics. Many of these criticisms are attacks on the perception of the continuation of the caste system. This is a fairly common view for critics of Modi and can often be observed when viewing Facebook or twitter comments, seeming to be mainly derived form his staunch Hinduism. Whilst there is plenty of abuse levelled at Modi for the continuation of the caste system it takes the minority of the total attacks on him as a majority of his attacks come at his personality. This highlights the importance of the character in Indian politics right now rather than that of policy, which can be mostly attributed to the BJP’s campaign which heavily leans upon their popular leaders’ charisma.

As I previously mentioned there are a few pages which are dedicated to criticise Narendra Modi one of which “Bluffed Master Modi” boasts almost 500,000 likes, whilst this is a very large Facebook page in comparison to the pro BJP and Modi pages it is relatively small, although still significant. The pages appear to be extremely negative and aggressive calling for the death of the BJP and some aggressive visuals to go with it.  However, the page is mostly in Hindi so reading this for a Westerner is subject to a google translate that whilst allowing me to get a picture of the age isn’t the most accurate depiction of reality, however the visuals are quite powerful. So, from the information I can gather I have derived that there is a good proportion of Indian people who are angry at the current state of Indian politics feel disenfranchised with it and this has come out in the form of aggressive online posting. It also demonstrates the divisiveness of Modi’s complex character. By delving into the social media side of Indian politics it has given an insight that would otherwise be unachievable, as it has given the public a voice that was previously hidden from international viewers of discourse.