They are young, highly qualified, motivated and represent the pulse of the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. Helping political parties with their election strategies, door-to-door campaigns and mobilising young voters, these engineers and MBAs, are working out innovative ways to handle the parliamentary polls.

IIM Bangalore alumnus and chemical engineer Partha Pratim Das, a student of public policy and management, had worked with two MLA candidates from the BJP and Congress in Karnataka last year. Both won with a good margin of votes.

“After that, I was involved in the Delhi Assembly election. I worked with four MLA candidates - one each from the BJP, Shiromani Akali Dal, Aam Aadmi Party, and the Congress. Two candidates won convincingly and one lost by a very close margin. In the Lok Sabha elections, I am working with a few candidates to plan the election campaign effectively and efficiently. It will help the candidates to know their organisation strength all across the constituency in a quantitative manner.”

Das aims to help the political leaders in creating a different election campaign. “We work on a detailed past booth-wise election analysis. After understanding the present scenario, we are helping them devise the strategy for the upcoming election at the micro level,” says Das, who started Chanakyya, a Bangalore-based political consultancy. He believes that a career in public policy is “challenging, exciting and multidimensional” because it gives a person an opportunity to work with political parties and helps in forming opinions about important policy decisions.

The consultancy aims to provide past data analysis – (from parliamentary to assembly to the booth level), and help in strategy formulation in campaigns for specific zones and constituencies. Help is also provided for the performance measurement system for party workers. They have also started managing social media/ online presence of the candidates they work with.

Vishnuvardhini DL, an alumna of IIM Ahmedabad, wanted to be a change driver in politics and also develop a strong opinion on how a political leader should function in the present scenario.

“I did a project for my entrepreneurship course at IIMA with the same idea. I have worked on ground-level management and data analysis. I have been involved with voter research and strategy development segments, and have worked with the BJP, Congress and AAP. I worked with four candidates in the Delhi elections last year. Over the last few years, there has been an improvement in awareness levels among students about the government they want,” she says. A London School of Economics graduate, Ela Bodas works with a sociopolitical start-up launched by a few spirited youngsters in June last year. “Our work involves facilitating greater engagement between the citizens, the political and administrative establishment.” They are also involved with analytics, digital and social media research, and campaign management at the grassroots for the BJP.

Source: Hindustantimes.com 

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