‘Gen Z voters are not just a force, but are influencing others too’

Praveen Chakravarthy, head of the Congress party’s data unit, in conversation with Amrita Madhukalya

After the Tamil Nadu Assembly elections, Congress leader Praveen Chakravarthy speaks about the rise of the Gen Z voter and the growing role of data and AI in elections.

l You were among the first in the Congress to sense the Vijay wave in Tamil Nadu. How did you do that? 

In July-August 2025, I was collecting ground-level data to gauge the impact of this new party, the TVK. I was quite surprised — not at the extent of support, but by the distinct age divide. Nearly 80% of people below 40 said they wanted to give this new party a chance and were tired of the same old two-party establishment politics.  At the same time, nearly 70% of people above 50 said they were unsure about the new party. 

I have worked on elections in India for 15 years and had never seen this sort of age divide, except in Punjab in 2022, when a similar sentiment led to the AAP government. 

I checked the data again, and it remained consistent. Then it struck me that voters below 40 constitute 41% of the electorate. If 80% of them voted for TVK, that alone translated to nearly a 30% vote share. I also knew that the DMK had not won re-election in its history; every time it is in government, it loses around 12 to 15 percentage points in vote share. When I combined these two, it became quite clear to me that TVK was going to do very well. It was difficult to estimate seats, but it was clear that they would cross 25% vote share.

l Is the Congress now open to non-traditional allies such as Jagan Mohan Reddy after severing ties with the DMK? 

Words like ‘sever ties’ are too strong. A lot of this has to be seen in context. The view from Delhi media is very different from how we see things on the ground in Tamil Nadu. 

This is neither unique nor the first time that parties, including the Congress, face each other in the state election but are allies in the Lok Sabha. The Trinamool in Bengal, Left in Kerala, and AAP in Punjab and Delhi are examples. At the national level there is ideological unity. With the TVK, too, the foundation continues to be an ideological alignment. From the very beginning, the TVK stated that the BJP was its ideological enemy and that it stood for secular, progressive politics.

l Will this change your Lok Sabha strategy with the I.N.D.I.A. bloc? 

We are mixing tactics with a larger strategy; the I.N.D.I.A. bloc is fundamentally about secular and progressive politics, federalism and states’ rights. It is about opposing the BJP’s idea of ‘one nation, one language’, ‘one nation, one religion’, ‘one nation, one food’, and ‘one nation, one festival’, and ‘one culture’. Are you suggesting that parties such as the DMK are now going to turn around and support this? If the BJP brings a Bill on delimitation, are we saying the DMK and others will support it? Clearly not. 

l How will AI reshape elections?

It is inevitable that technologies such as AI will start to permeate and play a big role in elections. But at the same time, I would also caution against over-reliance on data. At the end of the day, data is just a number unless you understand the context and meaning behind it. So, data can never replace people’s experience, observations and what they see on the ground. 

There will definitely be an increasing use of data and AI. It is inevitable.

People have said the TVK succeeded without any party infrastructure and was largely driven by social media. But I know they had a very strong data unit that was constantly gauging public feedback. 

l On social media, GenZ voters appear anti-establishment at this point. How do you plan to leverage that vote block in the 2029 LS election?

That is a very good question and something we need to think about internally. It is very clear that what we saw in Tamil Nadu—and also in neighbouring countries such as Bangladesh, Nepal, and Sri Lanka—is a generational shift in democratic politics about how voters are tired of the status quo, of establishment politics. It is an overwhelming message. What we saw in Tamil Nadu was the Gen Z voter convincing and coaxing their parents and family members to also vote the way they want them to. So they are not only a force by themselves, they are also an influencing force on the elders. The Congress party, too, must adapt to this changing reality. We need fresher ideas, faces, people, new narratives and ways of communication. We cannot remain prisoners of the past.

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are the author's own. They do not necessarily reflect the views of DH.