The Bihar Election Results were astounding. There’s really no other way describe it. The NDA breached the 200 mark and ended up with 202 seats. The Mahagathbandhan suffered a catastrophic defeat. I am sure the INC and the RJD will sit together and analyse the reasons of the defeat. The BJP, too, will study the results to see what worked for them. They will explore the possibility of applying these lessons in other states.
But beyond the numbers and the headlines, there is another trend that is not receiving enough attention. There is a vast gap now between social media narratives and on-ground political realities. And the gap is only increasing. Perhaps, it was always there. But since Covid, it has increased exponentially. I talked about it on X on Saturday.
The Bihar results also showed just how out of touch social media is with on ground political realities.
— Sensei Kraken Zero (@YearOfTheKraken) November 15, 2025
You could say the same thing even in 2015.
Since then, especially after Covid, the gap between the two has only increased massively.
If you only follow social media, you would believe that the NDA and the Mahagathbandhan are on equal footing. You would think that the Congress is giving the BJP a run for their money. But then, you see the state election results since 2024 and realise that it is not even a contest.
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The BJP won 48/90 seats in Haryana. The MahaYuti won more than 230 seats in Maharashtra of the 288. In Delhi, the BJP won 48 out of 70. Now in Bihar, the NDA has secured more than 200 seats out of 243. None of these elections were a close contest.
What shocked me most during the campaign, however, was the social media strategy that the Mahagathbandhan was running with. It is their campaign that made me recognise the fundamental flaw in their approach towards social media.
Optimised for Virality
It has been clear for a while that the opposition’s communications strategy has been optimised for virality. They measure the success of their social media campaigns based on likes, shares, comments and views alone. The Congress party regularly boast how they get more engagement than the BJP on social media.
It does not matter if it is true or not. But the takeaway from it is that social media engagement is what the they are after. Indeed, higher engagement is probably the only reason why Supriya Shrinate’s stocks have risen exponentially within the Congress party. I can’t think of any other reason why she would share the celebration video after INC’s 2024 Lok Sabha defeat other than that they knew it would work well on social media platforms.
Nevertheless, one thing is certain. The Congress party measures its PR success in terms of the virality of their posts. Perhaps, there is no other way to measure social media performance. But that is not a very valid metric to evaluate the performance of a political party. Indeed, there is good reason to suspect that social media virality has no impact on a political party’s ability to win votes.
Political parties have to convince the voter that they are a better option than their virals. But virality only ensures greater visibility. It does not say anything about whether the viral content has to potential to change people’s minds.
Why Virality is not a great metric
We have to take a look at why a content goes viral. Uniqueness, the ability to evoke strong emotions, an element of surprise and relatability are some of the primary reasons why content goes viral. What is not clear is whether people agree with the content.
The reason why two people share a piece of content may be dramatically opposite to one another. But for political parties, it is essential that people share your content because they agree with you. Agreement with the post is essential since they are looking to convince people to join their bandwagon. Virality does not measure that at all. And if you make it your ultimate objective, then you are likely to get suboptimal results.
For example, the Congress party is investing a lot in rebranding Rahul Gandhi as a Gen Z leader. Towards that end, they are sharing videos and producing content that features young women calling him ‘Pookie’. There are other viral videos where people are openly sexualising him.
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Now, if such content comes up on my feed, I will like share it as well with my friends and acquaintances. Why? Because I think it’s absolutely crazy for a political party to do this. It’s creepy and cringe more than anything else. But when the Congress IT Cell looks at analytics, they will see that the post has performed extremely well.
If they then come to the conclusion that they should double down on such content because it has performed very well, do you think it will benefit them as a political party? It’s easy to see where I am going with this.
RJD supremo Tejashvi Yadav was dancing on the streets with Gen Z influencers during his Bihar campaign. The reel went viral and performed astonishingly well. But is there any way to verify to what extent it helped the party in winning more votes? Perhaps, there is none.
The Fault in our Algorithms
Social media algorithms optimise a user’s feed greatly as per their likes and preferences. For example, if a person interacts with Context X, then the algorithm will show him more and more content like Content X. So, if you are interested in political content, the algorithm will show more political content. If you are interested in literature, the algorithm will show more content related to that.
That is the same with political content. What political parties can safely assume is that most people who interact with their content regularly are people who are already interested in politics. But the thing is, most people are not on social media for politics. They are just there for entertainment. X as a platform might disproportionately have politically-engaged users.
However, that is not the case with Meta Platforms and YouTube. And those platforms have far more users than X. Essentially, politically-engaged individuals on social media are not representative of the electorate. But it’s politically-engaged individuals who make your content go viral. So, with your obsession with virality, you are either playing to the crowd or attempting to convince people who will never vote for you.
In an era of radical depolarisation that we are currently going through, this dichotomy only gets more emphasised. To produce viral content, you have to focus on uniqueness and attempt to evoke strong emotions. But in the process, you might not appeal to the majority of the people who do not care much about politics. Also, if you are not politically engaged to begin with, how likely is it that a piece of social media content will influence your vote?
The adverse consequences of prioritising Virality over all else
There are two ways to gain attention and stand out from the crowd. Be so good at your craft that your work commands praise and compliments. Or be so bad at it that you become the laughing stock of the community. Unfortunately, both of this will get you virality. If you prioritise virality above all else, then either is fine with you. But if you are a political party and wish to convince people to vote for you, then you have a problem with one.
Virality cannot be an end in itself. Your overall objective matters a lot. If your end goal is making money from social media, then pursuing virality over everything else is fine. Take feminist influencer Divija Bhasin for example. She has been calling herself a ‘Proud Randi’ all this time. If her goal is farming engagement and making money, then she is doing fine. But if her goal is actually women empowerment, do you think she is doing very well?
The unfortunately reality is that in order to achieve social media virality, you have to be ‘terminally online’. But the more ‘terminally online’ you get, the more disconnected you are from reality. It’s flaw that most communications professionals can afford. But not when you are working for a political party. It will have devastating consequences if political parties start relying on ‘terminally online’ people for their social media.
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But it’s clear that the Mahagathbandhan has gone that way. Do you think a person in touch with reality would have suggested that sexualising Rahul Gandhi is a good idea? Or Tejashvi Yadav dancing on the streets? Readers might think I am focussing excessively on just two instances alone but I am only choosing these two because these are the most obvious examples of the phenomenon I am describing.
There are a lot of things equally worse. The Congress Party’s social media initiatives under Supriya Shrinate’s leadership has lost the plot in a lot of ways. They have become abusive, toxic and uncouth. Look at the Kerala Congress X account and judge for yourself whether it helps the party’s objectives. Sure, their tweets go viral. But at what cost?
The Social Media Bubble
The problems with virality that I have listed above contributes to the overall major problem. It can trap you in your own social media bubble. Then the algorithms will only reinforce it. And you keep sinking and sinking deeper into it. In the end, you start having these delusions that your fringe minority opinions are actually popular among the masses.
I am pretty sure the Congress party is suffering from the same problem. People in right wing political circles that I talk to keep telling me that the Congress party does not really believe in ‘Vote Chori’. That they really do not actually think that Rahul Gandhi’s Gen Z messaging is actually having an impact on ground.
But I have a different opinion on that. I know the effect being terminally online has on people. I have seen people who are convinced that their harebrained idea is greatly popular among the masses. The Congress party is made up of humans at the end of the day. And they suffer from all the flaws that the rest of us do. Why would being terminally online affect them differently than it affects the rest of us?
Rahul Gandhi has spent more time on social media campaigns than actual work on the ground. ‘Pookie’ videos with Gen Z influencers is no substitute for grinding it out at the local party headquarters. It is hilarious that he was not even in the country when the results were being declared. That is not sound strategy.
Social Media is important but a rethink is necessary
I am not arguing here that social media campaigns are not useful or unnecessary. No, they are important and will continue to remain so until India is a Democracy. There is no doubt about that. What I am arguing here is that chasing virality as goal in itself is what political parties should avoid.
A lot of BJP supporters argue that the party is losing out in the social media game. They have been arguing that since forever. But is it really losing though? The results speak for themselves. So, they must be doing something right.
No, social media is still extremely useful in spreading a message. The BJP’s campaign against the Mahagathbandhan over the insult to PM Modi’s mother could not have succeeded without social media. The same is true for the BJP’s message on ‘Jungleraj’ and insult to Chhath Pooja. Social media was crucial in disseminating the party’s message.
What I am saying is virality should not be considered a valid metric for success. If a metric is not useful to judge your electoral performance, then quite clearly, the metric is not useful.
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Nevertheless, there are some very easy ways that political parties can avoid the pitfalls of chasing virality. First of all, chasing virality for the sake of it should be avoided. It does not serve any purpose other than gaining attention from people. The two national parties and the prominent regional parties do not need attention. They have name recognition.
Secondly, good surveys can always serve to keep political party in touch with the pulse of the people. The better the surveys, the more effectively can a party craft its message for the electorate.
Thirdly, traditions are generally good. The traditional manner in which politics was conducted before the advent of social media is still the best path forward. There’s no credible alternative yet to grassroots politics. There is a reason why the BJP loves and cherishes its karyakartas so much.
Because at the end of the day, it’s these karyakartas who the take party’s message to the people. It’s on their backs that political parties build their empires. Without a sound organisational structure, it is simply not possible.
The Congress has focused more on social media than improving their organisational structure since years. I have been hearing analysts say on news channels that the Congress does not have enough ground workers since at least 2017. Nothing has changed in 9 years. 9 years is a long long time in politics. But they have succeeded beautifully on social media. But at what cost?
