Video war between BJP, Congress on Rafale deal

Hyderabad: While Rafale deal is becoming a touchy policy issue, the BJP decided to explain ‘What is Rafale deal’ by releasing a video in which actor Pallavi Joshi compares fighter aircraft to secure locks of a housing society and ends by saying ‘easy hai’. BJP IT cell chief Mr Amit Malviya on Monday shared a video on Twitter, which he titled “Rafale deal for dummies”.

The Congress, quick to retort, on Tuesday released “What really is the Rafale deal?” featuring actor Poorva Sharma who explains the Congress’ version of the deal and ends it by saying ‘easy nahi hai’. They use the same narrative as Joshi of upgrading locks in a housing society.

While the BJP’s Joshi plays the role of the present secretary of a housing society who claims to have clinched a better deal for the purchase of safety locks, the Congress’ Sharma noted that the “chowkidar” of the society tweaked the deal to favour his “mitr” (friends).

The concept of both the videos is a copy of a popular Scottish ad where a woman with a cup of coffee explains the Scottish Referendum.

Mr Akhil Karthik, a digital marketing expert, said that it is the correct time for political parties to come out with such videos explaining their side of issues and brainwashing people.

“This is the time when parties will try to hype such issues. During elections, sloganeering and other activities will go on and heavy information based videos like this Rafale deal won’t be given. When heavy information stuff is simplified by political parties, you really don’t know what or whom to trust. People should do their home work and read more, if they want to avoid any particular party’s influence,” he said.

Mr Karthik added that the job of a digital marketing team is to create stories. Evidently, the Congress came out with a quick retort in less than a day after the BJP uploaded the video.

Mr Karthik who was part of the digital marketing team for a politician, said, “People can make very good stories out of nothing which helps parties in pushing their propaganda. Any story can be given to digital marketing team who can tilt it towards one side. This is part of the complete brainwash and perception handling of what the owner thinks and is often one-sided.”

Another social media expert, on condition of anonymity, said, “To counter the opponent’s narrative on this defence deal, the Congress did retort but the reach and impact of the video needs to be assessed. Also having a known face on the video is another way to grab more eyeballs. These videos will continue to surface and won’t stop with Rafale. They try to strengthen your belief system. Only way to remain uninfluenced is by reading up more which most people don’t do, aiding to the creation of more such videos.”

The BJP’s video goes like this: Ms Joshi is housing society secretary who is planning to sign a pact with a French company to improve the society’s security lock system. She found that her predecessor spent close to 10 years in talks with the company for the pact in the plain-Jane lock system and found that the costs of maintenance and technological upgradation were not factored. She negotiated a new deal for locks including a promise that some of the locks would be manufactured in India. She claims to have clinched the deal for Rs 7,000 as against the Rs 10,000 struck by the previous secretary. 

The Congress’ video claims the Chowkidar (referring to PM Modi) has given the deal to a private agency who is his friend instead of a PSU (HAL). It adds the chow-kidar failed to reveal the deal price, but later it was figured out that the deal was sealed for Rs 18,000 as against Rs 6,000.