PM Modi, no stranger to online trolling, had once talked about ‘real power of social media’

While Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) owe a lot of their popularity to the presence of evangelists on Twitter, he is no stranger to being at the receiving end of trolls.
Online media is a murky world as many people, hidden behind the veil of internet, accomplish a certain goal of pulling another person down by producing an offensive or provocative post.
Troll as a noun is defined as a person, who makes a deliberately offensive or provocative online post. As a verb, it means to make a deliberately offensive or provocative online post with the aim of upsetting someone or eliciting an angry response from them.
‘Trolling’, as mentioned above, is not a new trend, as political leaders have time and again taken to public rallies to spew venom on opposition parties. But when this trolling takes the form of memes on social media, it makes the already-murky world further murkier.
Senior Congress leader Digvijaya Singh took to Twitter on Friday morning, and posted a rather offensive tweet, quite apparently a dig at Prime Minister Modi.
The meme posted by Digvijaya had a picture of Prime Minister Modi with text next to it that read, “Mere do achievements 1.) Bhakton ko Ch** banaya 2.) Ch*** ko Bhakt banaya.”
MODI BEST IN THE ART OF FOOLING: DIGVIJAYA
Singh added a caveat to his post by saying, “Not mine but couldn’t help posting it. My apologies to the person concerned. He is the best in the art of fooling!”
For the uniniated, the ‘bhakts’ here refer to the followers of Prime Minister Modi, another offensive attribute given by social media.
Years ago, however, when Narendra Modi was the chief minister of Gujarat, he held social media capable of bringing about a social change.
“It is important for us to expand our definition of what constitutes the social media. To me, it is not just about Twitter and Facebook. For instance, I am amazed at how YouTube as a medium of video-sharing has made e-learning accessible to so many people. Or when I look at an application like WhatsApp and how simple it is to use, one begins to appreciate the power of this medium. Often the first reports when a disaster strikes or an unfortunate incident happens are received via one of these social media channels. I see the real power of the social media come through during such moments of crisis. Recently, during the Uttarakhand disaster I was pleasantly surprised at the positive role played by the social media in bringing home news of the missing to their loved ones,” the then chief minister had said in 2013, in an exclusive conversation with ANI.
MODI ON TROLLING
When further asked about “one of the biggest complaints of the social media – what many people call ‘trolling'”, he said, “Our culture is known for its longstanding traditions of respecting our elders and our scholars. In the same vein, we worship and celebrate women’s power as shakti. Expressing one’s opinion on social media does not imply that we abandon our culture and value systems. Our conduct at home, offices and schools is based on certain well appreciated norms of mutual respect and dignity. The same ought to apply to our conduct on social media as well.”
There’s political enmity and there’s a political responsibility, and as Prime Minister Modi had in 2013 said: “We have to listen, appreciate and respect that sentiment, which is being expressed through the social media. Today scores of Indians have mobile phones. Even a simple thought expressed through the mode of a SMS can travel far and wide, in a matter of minutes, through multiple sharing. We must harness all possibilities that are out there in the public domain.”