Two "news" items that surfaced just recently highlight the challenges that Prime Minister Narendra Modi faces when it comes to media narratives. One story has been featured prominently in mainstream media while the other has reverberated on social media, even as it has largely escaped the attention of mainstream media. The first story is about how Indian Railways has sent a bill of Rs 4 crores to the local administration of Latur for the much hyped "Jaldoot" train service that supplied badly needed water to parched Latur. Just this small piece of news has destroyed the "feel good" factor generated by the efforts of Railway minister Suresh Prabhu to extend proactive humanitarian assistance to the drought affected district of Maharashtra. "Clarifications" would inevitably be issued. But the damage has been done. Modi's media managers (if he has any) might take consolation from the fact that large sections of mainstream media are implacably hostile to Modi.
But what should worry Modi more is the story that reverberated across social media on May 12th, 2016. The Ministry of Textiles sent out an innocuous sounding tweet that it has tied with the news channel NDTV to promote handicrafts. All hell broke loose. For Modi fans on and in social media, NDTV is an even bigger enemy than Rahul Gandhi. Scores of right wing supporters of Modi sent out anguished messages of betrayal and worse. Forget the more extreme views. This is what social scientist Madhu Kishwar who is a critic turned admirer of Modi sent out in a series of tweets: "NDTV facing bankruptcy after its bosses stole all money and parked it in offshore accounts. Hence BJP govt help is part of helping "weaker sections" …." BJP govt signing contract with NDTV whose money laundering scams actually caught by IT department is meant as goodwill message to Soniaji?" Neither the author nor BW BusinessWorld endorses these allegations. It is merely reporting what Modi supporters have to say.
But why should Modi worry about tweets like the ones shown above from Madhu Kishwar? There are two reasons for this. Large sections of mainstream media and the ineffectual elite that sets media narratives have indeed been implacably hostile to Modi. Many of them genuinely believe he is a danger to democracy; many are paid members of the Luytens Delhi ecosystem of socialism and secularism that has been patronized by the Congress for decades. Whether the reasons are genuine or fake, the fact is that Modi has always faced a hostile mainstream media. But Modi pulled a rabbit out of his hat to counter this. He harnessed the enormous power and reach of social media to completely bypass mainstream media and reach out to his aspirational supporters. So successful was his social media campaign during the 2014 Lok Sabha elections that even critics called him the "great communicator".
But too often since the euphoric days of May 2014, his social media fan and support base has felt betrayed. Contrary to what many journalists claim, Modi fans are not blind followers of the type nurtured by Arvind Kejriwal. They can be, and often become trenchant critics. This was on display early in the tenure of Modi when his government expressed its inability to reveal names of "black money account holders" to the Supreme Court. An overwhelming majority of his fans slammed Modi for failing to keep his election promises. Something similar happened during the implementation of the OROP. The interesting thing to note here is that finance minister Arun Jaitley was a common factor both times. Anyone who follows social media knows that Modi fans dislike Jaitley almost as much as they detest NDTV. But that's a different topic.
Many analysts, who are sympathetic to Modi, have repeatedly suggested that he must draw up a coherent media strategy. They have repeatedly told him that Mann Ki Baat and Tweets cannot be a substitute for a healthy and regular interaction with mainstream media, even if large sections of it are biased and hostile. Strangely, Modi seems convinced that the media strategy he adopted in the run up to 2014 will continue to work. Frankly, it is not working.
