The wave of change

This is the story of the youth, the power of We, the people, and the magic of staying connected!

Pallavpuram was just another sleepy town where corruption ruled. The local MLA Duryodhan Bhaiyya with his goon power, had a record of winning 4 consecutive polls from that constituency. Welfare was confined to a mere joke. The funds allocated by the centre were siphoned off midway by team Duryodhan before they reached its due recipients.

People suffered and hoped their plight would improve someday…

Perhaps this time, their wait was about to be over...

Shravan Kumar was the son of an honest police constable. Having grown up in Pallavpuram, he had been a witness to the atrocities of team Duryodhan and others. A Gandhian by thought, his only dream for his town was to get justice the non violence way.

He followed the election commission on twitter and facebook to know the various initiatives being taken for the upcoming general elections. Having completed his masters in IT, he volunteered to join the Ahimsa party as its technology head. It was not easy to expose team Duryodhan, for their connections ran up high till the centre. Shravan knew that the election commission was a neutral body. The right guidance to voters and fair elections would ensure a change of power in the general elections.

Duryodhan bhaiyya often lured the youngsters by free liquor and other freebies. They in turn, carried out booth capturing and fake voting for his party and also lured others.

Shravan knew if he was to awaken people, first the youth power had to be unleashed. For, the youth had the energy and guts to sweep away any tyrant from their town. He began connecting with the youngsters on facebook and twitter. Around the same time, WeChat a recently launched voice messaging service had become a rage with the youth of the town. They would spend hours sending each other voice messages and funny emoticons. Shravan and his party decided to make the best use of this opportunity.

They began sending voice messages to the youth about the state of things in their constituency and how they could exercise their right as voters to bring about change. The youth who had been till now, happy with Duryodhan Bhaiyya’s free liquor were beginning to realise they were losing much more in lieu of a cheap bottle of liquor.

Soon, the area heads of Shravan’s party formed online groups and communities on facebook and WeChat and shared the problems faced by the people. They shared articles on the rights and duties of voters; the various funds that the centre had allocated for the town. Every Friday, the area heads organised group chat sessions on WeChat where the youth discussed how they could exercise their rights and bring about a change. There were separate chat sessions for first time voters, and they were educated about their rights and duties.

The spark which Shravan lighted had by now transformed into the flame of justice.

Duryodhan bhaiyya and his goons were restless. Being used to their old violent ways, they never knew the power of social media. They hired a professional hacker to hack and disrupt the efforts of Shravan’s party, but failed.

A day before elections, the election commission also brought a secret gift for team Duryodhan. Every polling booth was fitted with surveillance cameras.

However, on the polling day, Duryodhan Bhaiyya’s goons tried booth capturing on few polling stations. While the surveillance cameras caught their act, few youngsters standing nearby caught their act on their mobiles. Within seconds the videos of Duryodhan’s goons went viral on Facebook, Twitter and WeChat.

This further awakened the people who had decided to sit at home for the fear of booth capturing. Knowing they were safe now, they happily came and exercised their vote. The old Mausi who could barely walk to the polling booth, gave a toothy smile to the media persons who had rushed after seeing the booth capturing video. “This is a day of change for Pallavpuram”, she said.

By evening, the booth capturing videos had crossed 1 million hits on Youtube. Duryodhan bhaiyya and his goons were nowhere to be seen. Finger print scan of every voter ensured there were no fake votes.

A day before the results, an online and sms poll signaled that the state of affairs seemed to change for good.

The poll results day was celebrated like a festival in Pallavpuram. Shravan’s party had won by a clear majority, breaking team Duryodhan’s winning spree. Within hours of the results being declared, Shravan crossed 100000 followers on twitter!

As the media persons rushed to interview the new youth icon of the country, Shravan thanked the voters in his online address and said, “Even the non violent have the courage to win. This is the victory of We the people and technology! Justice, Liberty, Equality and Fraternity are our rights and I am glad the youth have helped us bring about this revolution”

This post is written for Indian General Elections 2014 with Social Mobile Appscontest by WeChat and Indiblogger. #VoteForIndia