Besides door-to-door campaigning in housing societies and before citizens groups, political candidates are also wooing voters online, via social networking websites like Facebook, ahead of the civic polls on February 16.
With citizen candidates already making their presence felt online, party candidates don’t want to be left behind and have had special pages created where they are discussing civic issues and also following local groups.
“There are many active citizens groups and housing societies on Facebook. I have been interacting with them about various civic issues. It is helping us get a better idea of the area and issues faced by citizens,” said Amit Satam, a Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) candidate from Ward No 62.
“The discussion on social networking sites is very proactive and helps us engage with citizens from all strata of life,” said Vinod Shekhar, a Congress candidate from Ward No 227. “This is not only for election campaigning. I can keep interacting with them after the polls also,” he added.
Even Yuva Sena president Aditya Thackeray has been known to be active on social networking sites. Last year, he strongly opposed the move to censor all social networking sites. The move seemed to be intended to attract more youth towards the Sena for the upcoming civic polls.
Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) candidate Namita Khot from Ward No 94 has created a special page on Facebook to post election updates.
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