A Stand up Comedian called Rahul Gandhi

How do you describe Rahul Gandhi?

Beyond his fan club, this is how Rahul is described by Indians today.

1. Social Media calls him a Pappu – and it is not for no reason. You will know why after reading this writeup fully.
2. R Jethmalani frowned at him as a Disaster – This one speech will prove Ram J 100% right.
3. Youtube comments term him as a retard – And that is not longer an insult. You can see it for yourself why.
4. S Swamy “praises” him as a Buddhu – He has proved he's way beyond a Buddhu, in this speech.
5. VS Achuthanandnan laughed at him as an Amul Baby – This speech's logic will even make kids chuckle.

For now, let's politely call him a stand up comedian.. an unintended one, but that's OK :)

There are three parts to this writeup. The Video, Serious questions and Humorous comments. Ideally go in that order, but if you are pressed for time, skip the first or even the second section to run to the third section. 

Section 1:

Firstly, Watch this video of Rahul Gandhi's speech at the CII with hilarious scrolling texts, and you will know why we want to call him a stand up comedian. He turns into a joke by himself, makes no sense, has no oratory skills and makes a mockery of himself by going all around with zero meaningful message delivery.

Rahul Gandhi Epic Fails Marathon at CII (Chamber of Indian Commerce) 

Section 2:

After I made the mistake of listening to the entire video, a hilarious mistake though, let me ask Rahul Gandhi some serious questions. I swear to God, I could not make head or tail of what he was saying, so these are honest questions of a confused listener. If you have a chance to meet Rahul ever, as he has no presence in the social media directly, please pass on these questions to him and educate us about his answers.

1) Dear Rahul Gandhi, What is India?

Rahul: “There is a tendency to look at India as a country. In our everyday life we see India as a national structure. But if you go back slightly more than that, go back a hundred, two hundred years, you would find that India is energy, it is a force. If you go back a thousand years, two thousand years, you would find that force came from our rivers, Ganga, Yamuna, Saraswati. We worshiped these rivers and the reason we worshiped these rivers was because that is where our energy came from, and everything we had was built on these rivers. Now we have gone way beyond that. We have built structures that are allowing this energy to rise, to explode. And it’s an honour for me to be here because as this energy moves from India and goes abroad, you are the cutting edge. You are the people on the first line. You are the people who are our ambassadors. You are the people who tell the world what this energy is about“

Confusion: Dear Rahul, if India is not a country, but a national structure, which was energy 200 years back, also a force 200 years back, was the energy of rivers we worshiped 2000 years back, and now this energy is about to explode, and it will move abroad via the cutting edge first line of business people (the audience), who are also the ambassadors, what should they tell the world India is?? Can you come again?

2) Did anyone in the world think of India in 1991?

Rahul: “Over the last couple of years, you have done a tremendous job. The image of India
has changed. I went to University in 1991, and I remember, nobody thought of India.”

Clarification: Rahul, I don't know if you recall properly while getting into that 'unnamed' university in 1991, but I was old enough in 1991 to absorb the world views clearly. The world was laughing at India that went bankrupt by 1990. Yes, the image was not positive, but the world thought of India daily. It as even projected as a country just about to implode into a balkanized Asian region. Between 1990 and 1992, India was forced by all the major powers of the world, through World Bank and IMF, to get rid of the socialistic hurdles setup by your grand mother and great grand father. We call that now as an economic reform, but it took India a global shame of pawning its gold in London, to make balance of payments during that period. So dear, the world very much thought of India, but with lots of pity, thanks to how your family ruined India's economy by then. And the next phase is happening now with falling Rupee under your mom's government.

3) Rahul, how do you describe nights in India?

Rahul: “It was a dark night some years ago when my team and I got on the Gorakhpur”

Clarification: Dear Rahul, nights are dark everywhere in the word, keeping aside the artificial light or moon light :)

4) Rahul, how long does it take to travel to Mumbai from eastern UP?

Rahul: “from the dust of Gorakhpur to the glitter of Mumbai. Took us Thirty Six hours. It is called an Express!”

Question: Rahul, even in 2012-13 if it takes 36 hours to travel 1650 KM, and you sarcastically call that an “express”, shouldn't the blame go to your family that has ruled India for most part of these years without any significant improvement in the train speed?

5) What is Rahul's idea of the “spirit” of India?

Rahul: “I spoke to a young Muslim boy setting out to start his life. He had no idea what work he was going to do. I asked him, “Boss what happens if you reach Mumbai and there is nothing for you to do?”
(He said): “If I reach Mumbai and there is nothing for me to do, I'll get on a train, I’ll go to
Bangalore.” That is the spirit of this country. Forward moving; brave. ”

Explanation: Dear Rahul Gandhi, that is not called spirit of India. First of all a young man leaving home with no destination in mind, is a shameful state of poverty in Uttar Pradesh from where you and your mother are MPs. Secondly, what you are describing as “forward moving and brave” is actually the desperation of the poor to escape poverty in their small towns and villages, due to failed economic policies of successive governments in India, and most of them ruled by your party. Be ashamed!

You would have understood that young man's desperation only if anyone in your family worked for money in a regular job, during the past 4 generations. I am talking about 10 to 20 years of productive employment, instead of living off tax payers money. Sorry for being blunt, but you would have understood his poverty if you worked for even 10 years to earn a living in the fiercely competitive Indian job market.

6) Rahul, how do you describe monsoon early morning in Mumbai?

Rahul: “4’o clock in the morning, we walk off in the galis of Bombay, monsoon season, feet were going into puddles.”

Query: Sir, if there are puddles even in India's financial capital, can you imagine how much “Bharat Nirman” has happened in the smaller towns and cities of India during the past 9 years of your mother's governance?

7) Rahul, can you tell us about the most important infrastructure need of India?

Rahul: “We have to provide the roads on which our dreams are paved. And these roads can’t have potholes. They can’t breakdown in 6 months. They have to be big roads, because they are going to carry strong people, they are going to carry strong forces.”

Comment: Glad that you talked of roads. Do you know that the first job your family did after coming to power in 2004, was to slow down the massive road building project setup by Vajpayee government? Not only that, they even spent crores to remove his pictures from all those highways being built. And now you lecture about building roads? Wah!

8) Please tell us more about your train journey.

Rahul: “people were not the only things moving in that train. Ideas moved with them.”

Clarification: Rahul baba.. I don't know if you ever traveled for 36 hours in a train in your entire life, amidst ordinary people of India. I doubt you did considering the way you are talking about one train journey. Yes, trains carry people and trains carry ideas all the time. Ask any migrant to any big city and they will tell how they came with big ideas and positive spirit. Maybe you should travel in trains more often, particularly in the sleeper and general compartments.

9) What's the biggest problem in India today?

Rahul: “Our problem is not joblessness, it is lack of training and skills”

Shock: Dear baba.. do you even understand why people don't get jobs? Don't tell me you don't know the meaning of the word 'joblessness'!

10) Dear Rahul, describe India's educational system to a chamber full of business people.

Rahul: “Look at our text books, open them out. Most of the stuff is not really relevant to what they are going to do. Who knows what they are going to do. You know what they are going to do. Why? Because you are going to give them the jobs. You are the guys who are going to employ them. Do you have a role in our education curricula? Do they ask you? Do they? Does someone come to you and say, hey listen, what do you think? Does it happen? I am asking. Does it happen systemically? Do you have structures in universities? Not individual relationships. Do you have structures in universities that allow you to impact what the IIT is teaching? Do you? It is a question. You don’t. Those are the type of structures we have to build. Our universities structures are closed. They are silos. I meet these guys, they are brilliant guys, absolutely brilliant, but a university today is a network. It’s no longer a silo; the network has to be
connected to the industry. It has to take input from industry and it is not happening.”

Confusion: Rahul baba.. if India's text books are obsolete, if you are not sure who will give jobs to those studying those text books, if there are no structures in the universities, if the government does not consult business owners frequently, then it is whose fault? Your Congress party which has ruled for nearly all but 10 years since independence, or someone else? And, we are still scratching our head to make sense of what you said above.

11) What's Rahul's advice to a group of top business people of India?

Rahul: “And that is where you guys come in. You are the people who are going to take the lead for the creation of jobs”

Comment: Yes, they will create jobs. But what do you do with lakhs of crores of public money, being doled out through NREGA and other employment schemes? Can you tell the nation how many jobs were created during UPA 2 and contrast with earlier governments? How many jobs did you create as an MP of Amethi in the past 9 years?

12) Baba, what's that Kennedy speech excerpt you mentioned?

Rahul: “President Kennedy famously said that a rising tide raises all boats. I oversee a women’s self help group movement in my constituency and in Uttar Pradesh. Chatting to them once, I told them this and said the President of the United States said a rising tide raises all boats. A rising tide doesn’t raise people who don’t have a boat. We have to help build the boat for them”

Comment: Rahul baba.. even when giving metaphors they must make sense to the audience and also the people you talk about. Amethi is at least 40 KM from a big river and why do they even need a boat? If you talked to someone in Mangaluru, Prayag or Kanyakumari this boat analogy would have made sense to them. Something to think about..

13) Rahul sir, any views on alienation of communities?

Rahul: “When you play the politics of alienating communities you stop the flow of movement
of people and ideas – and when that happens we all suffer.”

Comment: Aha.. Do you remember your party's “Saffron terror” nonsense? When such politically and religiously motivated statements are made, without any supporting facts, will they do anything but alienate communities? Speak to Shinde, Diggy and Chidu once and also read what Wiki leaks wrote about your own views on this topic.

14) And baba, what was that comment about exponential thinking?

Rahul: “As we have moved forward to meet these challenges we must remember that we have
a tendency in India to think about solving all our problems incrementally. This is a
mistake. There are some problems, which require exponential solutions. Whenever
India has done well it has done so not by incremental steps but by radically
transforming its structures. Look at our successes – from the Green Revolution to
the White Revolution to the IT and Telecoms Revolution. All those successes were
the result of exponential thinking.”

Clarification: My head is spinning now. Who taught you about Green revolution, white revolution, IT and Telecom revolution? I am from a generation that lived through IT revolution. I can tell confidently that all the growth happened in steps. India did not jump from land line to smart phone directly. It went through basic phone upgrades. Internet for IT did not reach 20Mbps speed overnight. I used internet 18 years back via a modem when even 56 kbps was a luxury. There was no guarantee that most of the packets won't be lost in transmission. India did not get flashy Windows i7 laptops overnight. It took over 25 years to move from a 32 bit 386 processor to today's i7. India did not jump to cloud computing overnight. It took decades of computing improvements. Get your basics right Rahul baba..

15) Lastly, Rahul sir, what are the basic components of business?

Rahul: “The poor are one component of our country. Business is another component. The middle-class is the third component. We have to work with all these components.”

Comment: Ayyo... have you heard of producer and consumer model at all? Which college did you go to sir?

Did you have enough? I think I had enough of these serious remarks.

Section 3:

So, Let's read some hilarious comments from below the video:

1. “He should be honored with the title of 'Sir' after Ravindra Jadeja.”
2. “The level of radiation of dumbness from this guy is orders of magnitude larger than the radiation of all of the radioactive materials present on this planet”
3. “You forgot to put Rahul baba saying, Rani ki Jhansi!"
4. “The New channel should call him every week and turn this hour into a weekly comedy show. need a headache medicine asap now.”
5. “Share it on your Facebook profile titled as, ""Most inspiring Speech"", I bet you will lose all your friends...”
   
6. “My favorite: Your are empowered but your are dis-empowered.. LOL, River, Waves, Boats.. Beehive”
7. “My girlfriend's cat has a better IQ than this loser.”
8. “Watching this clip was very painful and frustrating! Leave alone his IQ... I think it is criminal even to bear him speak. Now just think if ever he becomes PM? What a terror!”
9. “My kid in the ninth standard would do a better job...what an Idiot”
10. “He is uttering retardedness like a tracer bullet..:P”
11. “My EARS are bleeding... But i still cant stop laughing !!”
12. “Has he ever listened to himself??”
13. And here is the best comment: “CII must have fired the guy who came up with idea of inviting him”

And, this particular comment sums up Rahul's IQ:

02:40 Poor people= Weak people?
04:34 "They are going to carry strong people". So leave the weak (=poor) people behind?
06:36 "let me go back to the women". (Then searches for the "women")
06:50 lost "it" (women??)
07:32 opposite of incremental is exponential?? (nobody taught that math to me)
09:30 5 crores divided among 700 pradhans. So each gets a "couple of crores". I must be a bad engineer to not know the math behind it
12:14 Definitely not if you are that guy on the horse
14:10 Yoga=Dance?

Long live Rahul baba.... and let 100s of such #PappuCII speeches flow into the “land of energy” :)

Text of the speech is used from ABP News source: http://www.newsbullet.in/india/34-more/40940-full-text-of-rahul-gandhis-cii-speech

Know Why You Are On Social Media

In my view, there are two kinds of social media users.

The first group comprises of those who are enthusiasts enjoying Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and others.Let's call them Social Media Enthusiasts.

The second group is a bit more serious one. It consists of Social Media Activists. These are the folks who generate serious content, trends, work towards a common goal (mostly), take on challenges from the opposing ideology etc. In short, the "workers", who have have a fairly passionate goal. In majority of the cases, these 'worker bees' won't be paid, but they still do this activism because it is important to their heart.

No one knows what percentage of Twitter or Facebook users belong to the second category. My best guess is that it could be around 20%. Because the majority of those who use their computers and mobiles, usually do for study, news gathering, communicating or entertainment.

Let's focus on the second group, the Social Media Activists:

I am going to take up an example which is very familiar to me. In India, there's a huge pool of Twitter and Facebook users, who are frustrated with the corruption and lack of growth, due to outdated socialistic policies of a particular dynasty headed party. So, they are indulging in a fairly serious campaign on the social media, to remove the corrupt regime and instill a relatively corruption free, progressive and fast developing India. Without getting into personalities involved here, that sums up what I call, a "Pro-Hindu, Pro-Bharatiya" social media group. They have deep passion in particular for their fellow Hindus, their society at-large and the overall good of their nation.

I am sure most people who are in this group, depicted in the diagram above as green small arrows, know their overall goal. But what's missing here is the cohesion. They miss out the boundary separating their individual heterogeneous behaviour to a team play necessary in the homogeneous format. That creates differences. Sometimes it could be over their focus on Dharma aspects, sometimes over engagement with media houses and sometimes over political movements within their broader ideological umbrella. The list is endless.

So how do we handle differences? It needs some broad set of rules which will guarantee individual enthusiasm in using social media, while the common alignment needed to achieve their collective goal.

Here are some rules that I propose:

1) Do not lose your cool when provoked.
You are here on Twitter or Facebook to have fun. Your time is precious. Your resources used like time and money are precious. Don't waste it by unnecessarily indulging in personal fights or mudslinging. Yes, "eeth ka jawab pathhar se" (Reply with a rock when provoked with a brick) sounds adrenaline pumping, but if you do it too often, it's a vicious cycle drowning sane voices.

There are people specifically on the social media to provoke you. They have their own agenda. Don't fall into their trap.

2) Do not abuse:
No matter how grave the issue is, no matter how justified you think that you need to swear, go very easy on hurling abuses. Best thing is to never abuse anyone's family, caste, religion, language, sex etc. But if you lose cool occasionally, try to correct your path. Apologize openly if necessary. There's no ego involved here as abuse is never justified. Abuse is always relative as for one person even calling 'idiot' might be an abuse. So you position your own comfort level, but always watch for reactions. You can fine tune the line between criticism and abuse.

3) Do not try to control other like minded people - Try to convince.
This is one side effect of considering someone as your "friend" on social media. You might have interacted online or offline or both with that person. You have great trust on that person. Suddenly, when the person does something, like raising a viewpoint that is totally uncomfortable for you, try to convince them. Do not try to force your way, as you will eventually lose. If the person says he likes meat and if you are a strong advocate of vegetarianism, try to convince or compromise. You are no-one to force that person to not speak about meat recipes. If the person is invited as a guest to a particular corporate house, which you strongly disapprove, explain why he/she must not attend, rather than trying to bulldoze.

4) Do not try any boycott.
Another big mistake by emotional folks. There are group efforts to boycott some nations, some corporations, some papers, some ideology or some public figures. It could even be an angry campaign against your former online "friend"! Go back and look at your common goal in the picture above. By advocating boycott, you will most likely mobilize only a small group within that big heterogeneous team.  It's not easy and most likely you will fail. If you have enough impact on the groups, eventually the boycott may happen in other ways, but it takes a sustained campaign and very tough to implement. If you just can't take a person, just disengage, instead of trying for a mass boycott. Know your limits.


5) Do not let your differences break the group:
Know your opponents and your overall goals. If you want to reform your society, bring in new & capable leaders, end the vicious cycle of failures, you need to work really hard as a team. There would be a very concentrated fight back from your opponents, who know why you are here. Your online campaign is making them uncomfortable. They want all tricks in the book to break your team or group. Hence, do NOT let them break up your precious network. Your opponents are much bigger, hugely funded and powerful mainstream entities. Co-opt when necessary and expose where necessary.

Know where you should agree to disagree. Individual freedom and the collective group goal are two things which needs to be addressed. If you develop enough closeness with your online friend(s), you would have shared phone numbers by now. So talk things through offline. Have in-person meetings in your cities when required to re-energize the collective goal. The more cracks that are visible in your group to your opponent, the more they will exploit those fault lines. "Divide and Rule" is something that we are all familiar with, and your cracks are invitation for your opponents to use the same policy yet again. Worse, the casual social media enthusiasts will get either confused or get swayed away from you, if they see serious infighting among yourselves.

At the end, your social network activism will fail if you are divided and fighting among yourselves. And that's exactly what those in the position of power and those who want to censor or shut freedom of expression, want. Don't fall into their hands so easily. Social media is a great equalizer and even a bigger game changer. Treasure its power and achieve your collective goal!


{Credit: Parts of the illustrative picture was picked from socialpsychology.org, top10hitz.com and dil-ke-colour-pencil-se.blogspot}

"Wake Up BJP" : An Open Letter to Nitin Gadkari

To,

Nitin Gadkari
National President, Bharatiya Janata Party
13, Teen Murti Lane, New Delhi - 110011
Cell: +91 9821080522
Tel: 91 - 11- 23011027
Fax: 91 - 11- 23013027
Email: nitingadkari@email.com

www.nitingadkari.org  

From,

The Friends of BJP on Social Networks.

Dear Nitin Gadkari ji,
  Namaskaar. This is a friendly letter from the social media friends of Bharatiya Janata party. We hope you are having a few minutes to read this important letter from people, who might still be fairly low on the hierarchy of voices that might be reaching you.

Why are we writing this to you? Because in simple terms, we genuinely care for the ideology Sangh Parivar stands for, the bright future India deserves, and most importantly, to give a fresh set of ideas to a party that claims to represent the "Bharatiyata", the core of India.

So what is in this letter that you don't hear from top level think tanks and strategists surrounding you? We think there's a lot. The suggestions might sound ordinary at times, but this is unpaid and unforced section of Young India speaking to you. A country where almost 2/3rd of the population is below the age of 35, their opinion is what is showing up in most of this letter. It would be your final judgment of course to take it or leave it, but just remember...these are the people who can make or break a large part of internet literate segment of 2014 voters of BJP.

So here we start, in no particular order:

1> Counter Attack: Turn back the clock a couple of months. Every news channel was on BJP's 'porngate' episode. Congress was conducting road show after road show, totally taking this negative publicity of BJP to masses. But what did BJP do when the infamous Abhishek Manu Singhvi CD came out? Yes, there were some restrictions he cleverly managed from court. But the entire social media knew what was happening. This was 100 times more serious a issue for the nation considering who and where parts. Did BJP take this in a big way to the masses? Did they conduct road shows? Did they make sure this is a big topic for news debates or editorials? In terms of intensity, BJP failed miserably we should say. Even for a seemingly fake case like Gujarat assembly porn watch, far more damage was done by anti-BJP forces at ground level. So sir, just eloquent parliament speeches can only go so far. BJP as a party is squandering serious opportunities like Rajbala's death during Ramdev's camp's midnight crackdown, AMS tape, ND Tiwari paternity case and Maderna case. No one is suggesting to hit below the belt or send un-parliamentary messages. But at least counter attack decently to get the core issue to the potential voters.

2> Scams and Propaganda: 2004-2012 must have been India's worst scam period. Majority of these scams are undoubtedly due to Congress party's misrule and their hapless "coalition dharma". Social media is well versed with details of CWG, President's land issues, 2G, Bofors, Coal gate, Karnataka Wakf Scam, Andhra Pradesh scams involving YSR family, Land grabbing in a number of Congress ruled states, Haryana land scam involving a reputed dynasty foundation, Mining frauds involving non-BJP ruled states and much more. How effective has been BJP here? When Congress has succeeded in equating Mining Scam = BJP, due to sustained propaganda, where is the PR arm of BJP? How much of the RTI support group muscle has BJP used till date? In states like Karnataka, where you have your own government, how many went to prison for Wakf Scam kind of massive loot? Yes, most people know that Congress is involved in these big scams, but where are the resignations? How many tainted CMs like Sheila Dikshit or their Ministers at state levels have quit? How many central ministers went on jail due to BJP's sustained efforts? Minuscule we must say. Yes, sir, as a principal opposition party, you can do a LOT better!

3> Media Management: If you have not grabbed this info by now, sir, electronic media for most part is termed as "paid media" in social media discussions. It's almost a synonym today. Such is the poor image and credibility of India's TV channels. One of the key reason being their rabid anti-Hindu propaganda and in particular anti-Sangh or anti-BJP propaganda. You can go through Karnataka Bhagavad Gita episode, UP's Sushma Swaraj and Mayawati "heartless" episode, or Delhi court's Mohan Bhagwat's Karkare episode. Media has been ruthless and loud in defaming BJP at every given opportunity. Most of the times, they get caught on social media like Twitter, Blogs and Facebook. But has BJP used that info? If yes, how effectively? When Karnataka Bhagavad Gita Abhiyana was projected as a state sponsored episode, why didn't BJP seek legal course against a prominent media house to prevent such recurrences in the future? When a TV program insulted 5 crore Gujaratis as "traditionally effete people" showing Narendra Modi's visuals, where was the noise from BJP? When Sushma Swaraj was misinterpreted, why didn't BJP seek a public apology from another media house? When lies are propagated that 2002 was India's worst minority dead-body count, why is BJP not talking about the unfortunate Nellie massacre from 1983 to give the truth to people?

Not countering the negative and baseless propaganda is hurting BJP, and also not projecting the pro-BJP news items. For example, many Christian candidates winning in Goa under Manohar Parrikar's leadership should have been a serious topic of discussion when it involves a "Hindutva" party per media created image. How come your strategists, friendly aspects in media and foot soldiers didn't take that to millions of homes?  When Karnataka chose its latest CM via secret ballot, that could have been projected as a US style primary, instead of what media projected as "puppet" selection. Where is the credit for superbly implementing Bengaluru Metro? How about Narmada canal wonders? How many even remember today driving on Golden Quadrilateral that it was Vajpayee's government that did wonders? Where are the positives from Chhattisgarh, Bihar, Punjab, Madhya Pradesh etc.? Web based Yuvai TV is a good initiative by some energetic individuals, but you have miles to run before you can catch-up anywhere closer to the grip anti-BJP ideology has on Indian print and electronic media. The media which gave serious negative publicity to one unverified Varun Gandhi speech, never did even 1% of that damage to Congress for a veteran Congress leader Kagodu Thimmappa's "cut Hindutva hands" hate speech.

Sir, in short, you need huge efforts on media management side. Own media houses, manage current media houses and work on creating a pro-Sangh alliance of broadcasting outlets. This is easier said than done, but you might not be gauging the ripple effect of negative publicity, day-in and day-out.

4> Image Makeover: Sorry to say this Mr.Gadkari, many in the young India we interact with, perceive BJP today mostly as a "B team of Congress". Per social media, the true opposition in India today are: a) Supreme Court. b) Social Media. c) Subramanian Swamy. The "3S Opposition" to be put it that way:) That's a serious problem you need to work on. Congress talks of secularism, you also do it now. Congress talks of socialistic populism, you also talk the same. Congress talks half-heartedly about Lokpal & other watch dogs, and you also do the same. Congress is a High Command driven decision making system, and you are also the same now. Congress talks of reservation, and you do that too. Congress talks of growth and you too do that. We understand that many of these are political compulsions. But where is the difference for a casual observer? The difference was evident 22 years back, but not anymore! You should be able to convey to a 22 year old voter, "what is BJP" and "how is is different from Congress" in 5 to 10 sentences. Can you do it sir?

More importantly, not just saying why BJP is "different". But living by that policy at all states that BJP is ruling, is far more important. If you stand for Lokpal, implement good Lokayukta policies across your ruled states. If you stand by for anti-cow-slaughter, then legally push the Governors who are becoming impediment for the same.

5> Projection of a PM Candidate: BJP is a democratic party, so there is always an opening for dissent or healthy competition. This is a great difference compared to a dynasty centric sycophantic setup on the Congress side. But since we have less than 18 months for campaigning to start for 2014 elections, you need to project your PM candidate soon. Project candidates for all key positions like Home, Law, Deputy PM (if any), Party Office bearers openly and clearly. Clarity is most important here, in spite of the inherent risks involved in projecting earlier. There's always a chance of polarization of the voters, but without a projection, BJP will be playing into the hands of Congress and media's negative speculations. We wish to inform you that the popular names for top positions on the social media are Narendra Modi and Subramanian Swamy for quite some time. Those two are more popular with young Indians than any of your Delhi based senior leadership. You can run online polls or surveys to feel the pulse better yourself.

6> Standing for Party Loyalists: Bangaru Laxman was in news, albeit negatively, last week. We are not suggesting to protect any corrupt or wrong-doer. But many voices on social network suggested that he was unfairly trapped, when he had no decision making capability as a minister or anything... worse, he seemingly offered a receipt too. Where was BJP's defence for him? Did you see how Congress stood behind P Chidambaram and SM Krishna when they have much worse charges? Did you forget that "Dalit" card is very powerful in India? To take this topic a step further, lots of people in young India feel that BJP has resorted to use and throw policy over the past few years. Kalyan Singh, BS Yeddyurappa, Uma Bharati, Vasundhara Raje, BC Khanduri are some examples of mass leaders who are either sidelined or under-utilized by BJP today. What we, on the social network feel, is that your party pays too much attention to what pro-Congress media plays out about your leaders. As a result, you are quick to succumb to media pressure or Congress propaganda. What you might not be realizing sir is that, you are getting trapped in their strategy to strip BJP off its mass leaders, the people who can win states on their shoulders. Yes, there will be charges against them, but you need to balance the "party with a difference" tag with "Indian rules that everyone else plays with". Hope you get our message. One of the loudest criticism of BJP's top 4 or 5 leaders today at Delhi, is that, they hardly can win any states with their strategy or charm or mass appeal. Don't get us wrong for this criticism. Ponder upon, why people are saying that.

By the way, if your party was sleeping, Sonia Gandhi, the UPA chairperson, was shown with up to $19 billion as assets by an influential Business Insider magazine. This is against just a crore or two of declared assets by the same person. Some quick maths indicate that that amount may be almost a crore TIMES bigger than Bangaru Laxman's amount in question. Yes, one crore times nearly sir.. Hope you ponder more on a huge missed opportunity!

7> Legal Muscle:  Who doesn't know Subramanian Swamy? Of course everyone knows this one man show, in the name of Janata party from Tamil Nadu. But here is the scoop. Have you wondered how a party, with zero MLAs and zero MPs in India, is almost bringing the mighty Congress empire to its knees via legal muscle? On the other side, BJP, a party with celebrity lawyers, has not done anything substantial to get this government on its knees. Be it CWG, or 2G or any scam worth its name, BJP lawyers are not fighting to give a fatal blow to any key minister of Congress. In fact, hush-hush talk on social media suggests that some key lawyers might even have worked in favour of some accused on the Congress roaster. Serious problem sir.. Take a deep breath and analyze the situation as well as the perception.

8> "Bharatiya" issues: We know that BJP is strongly for Kashmir pandits's return rights, hanging of anti-nationals like Kasab & Afzal, deportation of Bangladeshi infiltrators, bringing North East people to mainstream, among other sensitive but important topics. But sir, you can do far better. RSS has the world's largest grass root presence. Millions of volunteers are available to take the Bharatiyata message to lakhs of villages through them. In spite of them, if BJP is not able to educate an average Indian about the massive security & integration risks, resulting out of votebank politics. A simple example. Till earlier this year, most of us didn't even know about the plight of Hindu refugees from Pakistan Occupied Kashmir. Now when we hear the separatist views highlighted on English channels, we see the hypocrisy of sidelining the SC/ST Hindu plight in Jammu's refugee camps. Please work on the Bharatiya issues aggressively taking sincere help from the cadres.

9> Alliance in Key States: Many of us view the same sentiments here. There are over 240 Lok Sabha seats in TN, AP, WB,  Kerala,  Odisa and UP. That's just under 30 seats to half way of Indian parliament's lower house. Where are the allies of BJP here? If an election is held today, will BJP be able to win even 20% of these crucial seats? Without them, how can you dream of 2014? Congress has almost given 2014 to BJP on platter via a corrupt and inept regime. We are sure you have serious strategists working with you on this topic, but we just thought, we inform you nearly 2 years before the next scheduled election, as we see very little on the ground in these states.

10> Not wasting time: If you ever open a Twitter account and seek opinion on how to improve BJP's chances, we guarantee, this topic will come up. This particular topic is from those who are frustrated with BJP's recent attempts to portray itself as secular. The message from them to you is that you should focus on your Core Ideology. India is secular because Hindus are mostly secular. That's the truth. Take more advice from the super successful undercurrent of Indian society, the RSS. For many people like us, BJP is just one major project of the Sangh Parivar, among the 1,60,000 Bharatiya projects they have! Don't feel bad, but that's how young India that we interact with perceives your party. So don't ever cut the umbilical chord with the ideological nerve center.

BJP needs to first convince 82% of Indians, who are Hindus of all segments and castes, that it is their best hope. That's a huge challenge considering 64 years of systematic division of Hindu votes into innumerable caste and language vote categories. If you can manage to unite them, rest will fall in place. Your portrayal of Rama Rajya or Hindu Rashtra has been severely distorted as "Hindus Only" India by your detractors. We know that's not the case, but you have to do a stellar job selling that to your potential voters. We know on social media that Congress is severely "Minority first" ideology right from Khilafat movement days 92 years back. There's nothing surprising at all to a careful observers. But it's a joke that they can stand in public and term BJP as communal and claim themselves as Secular. This is even after Shah Bano or UP Muslim communal reservation speeches. This is where BJP failed big time. Correction time now! Primarily being pro-Hindu or standing for Hindu human rights, does NOT mean, being anti-Muslim or anti-Minority. Every country has major parties catering to the majority's wishes and aspirations. Opposing minority appeasement like massive (and un-Islamic) Hajj subsidy, is not opposing minority rights. Narendra Modi's all-inclusive development is just one example you can use with facts and figures, minus any rhetoric.

11> Engaging with Digital World: Social media may be in its infancy in India, but sir, let us assure you, it has already cut some major victories. Radia tapes were discussed by mainstream media due to social media pressure. Various riots were even reported because of social media trends. Numerous shady scams and shady acts like AMS CD, came out due to buzz on social media. BJP needs to use this nascent opportunity, like the successful Subramanian Swamy, via Tweeple conferences and weekly online chats to feel the pulse. This can also be used immensely to perpetuate the superb development efforts of various BJP state governments. We might be a few million on web today, and no way comparable to the 100s of millions in rural India, but the trend from here can only be one-directional. More strength to social media and we hope you become an early conqueror of this open space. As a first step, you can also instruct your IT cells to get key digests of social media's political topics, and circulate the gist among the decision makers of the party. We assure you, there's immense information out on Twitter, blogs and Facebook, that you can win any issue in a debate tomorrow! Encourage all your key leaders and parliamentarians to be on social media, and truly engage with the people when time permits. Most importantly, listen to BJP supporters and sympathizers, when they criticize your policies, instead of blocking them to shut their voice.


We hope you read till here, and more importantly realized WHY we are writing this open letter to you. Now please act precisely and in a timely fashion. You know it and we know it... the ONLY party in India today, that can win 3 digit Lok Sabha seats other than Congress, is BJP. Don't let down the folks opposing Congress..for India's sake!

- Signing off with a loud "Vande Mataram"
Your Social Media Friends.

PS: Read comments below for more from online friends on the same topic.