Interaction With Gamers To National Creators Awards: Back To Back Campaign Coups By PM Modi?

An English literature professor of this author once explained in a class as to what is a ‘classic’. “Anything that equally engages three or more generations — me, my father, my son, and my grandson — can be called a classic,” he said.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi is a classic. His innate ability to connect with the audience of any demographic — age, class, ethnicity, linguistic, caste, religion — makes him a classic in the truest sense.

At the first National Creators Awards on 8 March, he looked at as much ease amongst the gen-Z and millennials as when he’s meeting middle-aged business leaders or grey-haired politicians.

Same was the case last week when he met seven of the country's top gamers including Animesh Agarwal, Mithilesh Patankar, Payal Dhare and Anshu Bisht.

At the awards, when he said “thodi si vibe bhi to check ho jaaye” (let’s do a small vibe-check), Prime Minister Modi in a way contrasted his own statement made to Ranveer Allahbadia earlier at the event that he’d have to become 50 years younger to “match the wavelength” with all of them.

His wavelength seemed in complete sync with the young audience at the awards and while interacting with young gamers.

Modi’s ‘Tryst’ With Legacy Media

Prime Minister Modi has often been attacked for not doing press conferences. Now, he has his reasons for being hostile to the Left-lutyens dominated adversarial journalism that hounded him for more than a decade when he was the Gujarat chief minister.

Still, he does give occasional interviews though. Nevertheless, the point here is that the Prime Minister looked at the media as a medium to talk to the people.

However, given legacy media's attempts to wield unscrupulous influence beyond its role and the rise of social media allowing direct connection with people, he no longer feels obligated to cater to these influence brokers. The days when journalists could boast about deciding cabinet berths are long behind us.

In 2019, a previously-prominent journalist of the same creed lamented, “I think politicians of all hues have developed their own mechanisms for engaging with the media. I promise you it doesn’t make me happy as a journalist to say this. But I believe the mainstream media is heading to absolute irrelevance in being able to influence how a voter votes in this country today. I literally believe that.”

Prime Minister Modi has chosen to communicate with people directly. He was amongst the first politicians in India to realise the potential of social media back in early 2010s when the legacy media ridiculed his tech-savviness as baroque.

Then came his monthly radio programme ‘Mann Ki Baat’. Now immensely popular, the programme completed 100 episodes last year. A survey by IIM-Rohtak revealed that at least 23 crore people have listened to or watched ‘Mann Ki Baat’ regularly and over 100 crore have listened to it at least once.

Modi’s Trust Building With The Influencers And Content Creators

It is no coincidence that the Prime Minister is now looking at those who have a direct influence on the young minds.

National Creators Awards were yet another example of Prime Minister Modi being ahead of the curve when it comes to sensing the pulse of changing times.

In his address at the awards, Modi literally gave away his secret if anyone, especially the opposition, cared to take notice.

He said, "People ask me what is the secret to your success? I don't go around revealing it to everyone. Does a restaurateur ever show his kitchen? But I'm going to tell you. By god's grace I can get a sense of the coming time. And so, this is an award that is going to become very prominent in the coming times."

What's crucial here? "I can get a sense of the coming time." He knows that the Internet-generation holds sway on the young electorate. He knows that while this ‘age of influencers and content creators’ seems to be nascent, it is here to stay. And grow. Hence, these awards and the roundtable with the young gamers.

In the last year, ministers and officials from the Modi government seemed to be on a spree, appearing on podcasts and v-logs of popular content creators putting across the government's vision, performance report card, and aspirations.

This was probably done after the realisation that this space has traditionally been dominated by the Left. The motive was to propagate the long suppressed non-Left narrative to youth, hitherto not made available to them thanks to the close-knit Left ecosystem.

Expectedly, the ecosystem got riled up on the alternative perspectives (not the dominant Left oriented) getting platformed on such a large scale.

Subsequently, there was an all-out and blatantly concerted attack on YouTubers and Podcasters who hosted ministers and officials. Ever since these interviews started, some knew this was coming as the Left cabal isn’t exactly known for being tolerant of "other" views getting any space in their "space".

Be it the podcasts and v-logs or invitation to social media ‘influencers’ for Ram Mandir pran prathishtha or enlisting content creators for several other government initiatives, National Creators Awards were in some sense a culmination of these efforts right before the elections only to be bookended by this invitation to the gamers.

When Malhar Kalambe, who won the ‘Swachhta Ambassador' award, expressed his willingness to collaborate with the him on cleanliness drives, Prime Minister Modi quipped in affirmation, “iss chunaav mein bhi safai hone wali hai” (In these polls too there is going to be a cleanliness drive).

Modi’s ‘Collab Request’ To Young India

Now this is not to say all of this was purely political. Rather politics was an auxiliary outcome.

One only needs to watch Prime Minister Modi’s interaction with the content creators to understand the breadth and depth of this initiative. He listened to them. He peppered them with insights.He engaged them in banter. He asked for more from them. He asked them to take up a “Create On India” movement and “Create For The World”.

Ranging from ‘Mission LiFE’ to ‘democratisation of technology’, from ‘tourism and handicrafts’ to ‘Indian fashion’, from ‘sleep and mental health’ to ‘exam stress’, from ‘nutrition and millets’ to ‘organic and natural farming’, from ‘semiconductors’ to ‘AI’, and from ‘naari shakti’ to ‘drugs’, he covered it all.

Referring to the upcoming polls, he called upon the creators to generate awareness among young voters to come out and exercise their right to vote.

While interacting with gamers, Prime Minister was forthright in addressing the issue of societal perception towards gaming as a profession. He did so by candidly recalling his own remarks from an earlier ‘Pariksha Pe Charcha’ event, “Ye PUBG wala hai kya?” (Is it the PUBG guy?).

He also enquired about the common misconception of equating gaming with gambling, "Kya aap gaming or gambling ki ladaai face karte hain?" (Do you face the challenge of distinguishing gaming from gambling?).

While gamers asked for a regulatory body, the Prime Minister emphasised against regulation saying, "It must remain free, only then it will boom."

He stressed how he wanted to “take government out of people’s lives, especially the middle class” as it is in government’s nature to poke into everything. Bold words but very reassuring for youngsters who seek freedom in their day-to-day lives from the prying eyes of the state.

At the awards, the Prime Minister’s vibe was dipped in the slang of gen-Z and millennials. He made a “collab request” to the young content creators to highlight various issues of national importance.

This was him as an elderly trying to fit in. And he did so effortlessly. Comedian Shraddha Jain (AiyyoShraddha) while receiving the award said as much about PM Modi, “today your spontaneity has floored us all.”

Raj Shamani, a popular podcaster, said this while introducing him, “I want you to thank your stars guys that he is not a content creator. Else we’d have to shut our shops.”

He even had his gaming alias ready when the gamers requested him to select one. “People have already given me one – NaMo,” he said.

When they discussed the slang used for communicating while gaming, the Prime Minister promptly nodded when the term ‘noob’ was mentioned. He even told them how government officials too communicated using a different lingo. ‘NaMo’ then also went on to play some games with these gamers who were surprised how quickly he caught up.

Back To The Politics Of The Event

Towards the end of his speech at the awards, Prime Minister Modi said, “don’t think that today’s event is for the Lok Sabha elections”. But then he went on to give a guarantee to the audience that he will be giving away these awards the next year too.

In a smart attribution, the Prime Minister applauded the creators to have forced the government to take notice. He said, “maybe for the first time some sector’s youth has inspired and compelled the government to think about them.” He credited the organising of these awards to digital content creators of the country.

Now, it is anyone’s guess as to why would the Prime Minister take time out of his busy election schedule to give away awards to young content creators of the Internet. Why would he meet young gamers who largely have a non-voting following when he could’ve addressed two more election rallies in Tamil Nadu or conducted a roadshow instead?

Does the fact that a large chunk of voters this election is going to be young first-time voters have anything to do with that? Or the fact that a large chunk of the minor audience of these gamers will be voting for the first time in 2029? Is he campaigning for both — 2024 and 2029? Well, that is the buzz. But we leave it to you to figure.

At the same time, the opposition seems clueless about tapping into young first-time voters. All they’ve been trying to do is prop up and share videos of a YouTuber who is just back from Germany.

While Prime Minister Modi sets the narrative and lets young Indians discuss, debate, and absorb it, the opposition is looking up to a YouTuber to set a narrative for them. A sorry state of affairs.

On one hand Rahul Gandhi goes on ridiculing young reporters, calling the youth of Varanasi drunkards, sliding ultra-left with his ‘wealth redistribution’ cacophony, and carrying the sinister bogey of caste census and ‘jitni abaadi utna haq’.

While on the other hand, Prime Minister Modi is engaging with and giving wings to youth’s aspirations of a new India, a ‘Viksit Bharat’.

So now, what happens next? Modi will keep winning. Opposition will keep whining.