Taking down MufflerMan: Delhi BJP’s six-step plan to take on AAP on social media

New Delhi: Unfazed by the Aam Aadmi Party’s aggressive campaign on social media ahead of the assembly elections, the Delhi unit of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has decided not to take on AAP’s popular hashtag ‘MufflerMan’, but instead has started to make its presence felt on social networks. The Delhi BJP has set up a dedicated IT Cell, which is being monitored by former AAP leader Ashwini Upadhyay, who has recently joined the BJP and has been appointed as the spokesperson for the party’s state unit. “We have finalised our social media campaign strategy. In order to strengthen our presence on social networks it has been made mandatory for all active workers of the party, including MLAs and councillors, to have accounts on Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp and Hike,” Upadhyay told Firstpost. “Our Facebook page will be regularly updated and we will make sure that all the posts will have maximum number of shares. Our whole campaign will revolve around ‘good governance’,” he said. [caption id=“attachment_1832761” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Representational image. Reuters[/caption] “Although we are not taking the AAP’s campaign on Twitter with hashtags ‘MufflerMan and ‘Kejriwal Fir Se’ very seriously, we keep tweeting regularly to counter AAP’s self-proclaimed achievements,” the BJP leader said. According to him, the blueprint, was discussed and finalised in a meeting of social media experts and industry honchos on 29 November, is as follows: -  The party has created a group of 5,000 active members on WhatsApp and all the members of this group have been directed to create accounts on Facebook and Twitter. - It is essential for each of the 5,000 workers to add 50-100 friends everyday on Facebook. By 31 January 2015, the Facebook friends’ list of each member should reach the limit of 5,000 friends. - Liking the Facebook page of the Delhi BJP and ensuring others do the same is mandatory for party workers.  The party wants to raise the number of likes on its Facebook page from 12.5 lakh to 25 lakh. - It is mandatory for each and every member of the group to create five separate groups on WhatsApp, one group on telegram and one on Hype so that they can reach out to maximum number of voters. And all messages given the Delhi BJP headquarters should be shared in the groups. - All active workers of the party have been asked to use the Facebook cover photo of the Delhi wing of the party as the cover photo of their individual Twitter and Facebook accounts and this photo should be changed every Monday. - It is mandatory for all active members of the party to immediately like and retweet all the posts and events posted on official Facebook and Twitter accounts of the Delhi BJP. Interestingly, while the party officially states that its fight is against the Congress in the upcoming election in the national capital, two senior leaders of the party admitted that AAP is their real rival. “We have a direct fight with the AAP in at least 58 seats of the 70-member assembly here. The AAP is very much active on social media and it has a great following here. We need to criticise their policies and works using the same platform,” one the leaders said. “Congress is a threat for us only in eight Muslim-dominated constituencies. But we are sure that we will snatch at least five of the eight Muslim majority seats – Matia Mahal, Ballimaran, Okhla, Mustafabad and Seelampur – from Congress,” the other senior leader added.