Left to use social media to connect with new generation

The Left has decided to use social media platforms to connect with the new generation.

The Communist Party of India (CPI), the oldest in the country, has taken the lead and constituted a group to take up the task of making visible the party and its leaders in the virtual world. The party which now has a minor presence on social media will try to acquire big space on such platforms.

“We have discussed the issue in our party congress at Puducherry. We have decided to increase our presence on social media to attract young generation. We admit that we have not given enough importance to this new mode of communication. We have formed a group which will work for increasing our presence on social media,” said CPI national secretary Atul Anjan.

Anjan said the young generation is under the influence of social media and we cannot ignore it.

Faced with dwindling number of middle class recruits, the Left parties are desperately looking for better influence among middle class. Right now, most of the Left leaders have very scanty presence on social media. Leaders like Prakash Karat, Sitaram Yechury, Sudhakar Reddy or D Raja are not seen tweeting or posting their response on Facebook.

Unlike old generation Leftists, the young Marxists like CPIML General Secretary Dipankar Bhattacharya or party’s national secretary Kavitha Krishnan are quite active on social media and they use it to communicate with the wider world. The task will not be easy as the Left leaders themselves believe that the new economy has benefited the new middle class and this is the reason why the middle class has moved away from the Left ideology.
“The emergence of a huge middle class in India, and its acceptance of neo-liberal economic policies and globalisation as it also benefited to some extent, have alienated a big chunk of them from the Left,” says the political resolution of CPI.