They are young professionals, not professional politicians, but passionate about elections.

Some are kin of candidates, some are not, but all of them brought something different to the election campaign.

The Telegraph spoke to a group of such young men and women across several Lok Sabha seats to find out the flavours they added to the campaign, from digital outreach to data analysis, and how they balanced their professional commitments and their passion.

Data analysis

Nirban Roy is a data analyst with a private bank from where he has taken a short break to work as the man in charge of the war room for his mother Mala Roy, the Kolkata South candidate for the Trinamool Congress and the sitting MP.

Nirban, 29, is a former student of Presidency University, where he studied economics.

He managed the backroom of his mother’s campaign. As someone working in the field of data analytics, Nirban sifted through big data to pick trends.

“I analysed data to find out the population trends across the constituency. Where there are many women voters in a particular booth, we went door to door highlighting the Lakshmir Bhandar and Kanyashree schemes,” said Nirban.

He also selected campaigners for his mother on the basis of data analysis.

“We had Mamatabala Thakur (a leader from the Matua community) campaigning in neighbourhoods with a sizeable Matua population,” he said.

In booths where Mala Roy did not do well in the 2019 elections, Nirban held meetings with Trinamool youth workers to work more on those areas.

“I do data analysis at work all the time. So, it’s easy for me,” said Nirban.

Digital campaign

Some of these young campaigners pointed out how digital campaigns and the use of social media have become crucial, almost as important as door-to-door campaigns and street-corner meetings.

“Digital campaigning was there in the 2019 Lok Sabha and the 2021 Assembly elections as well. But this time, it became very important,” said Tamasree Chakraborty, 26, who campaigned for her uncle Sujan Chakraborty, the CPM candidate from Dum Dum.

Tamasree is an electronics engineer and works for an MNC. She grew up amidst Left politics because of family connections but has never been actively involved in it.

“We have created several entertainment videos, carrying messages about recent issues. These have become viral (on social media),” said Tamasree, who managed her uncle’s digital campaign with a team of young party workers.

One such video shows a newly-wed couple seeking blessings from the bride’s mother-in-law, who gives them a box of gifts, apparently gold. When they open the box, it is full of medicines. The husband and wife are very happy to receive it.

“This refers to high prices of medicines, which are out of bounds of many people,” said Tamasree. “We have also created a new slogan: ‘Dum Dum-e Sujanda Sure’. This has become viral too,” she said.

Nirban, Mala Roy’s son, advised his mother to use drones more frequently for her campaign.

“Drones have been used earlier, but not like this time. We are using drones and posting videos captured by them of big rallies with many people. This is giving an effect which videos taken from the ground cannot give,” he said.

Communication

Promita Saha Ghosh, 37, was in charge of running the BJP’s campaign in a section of New Town — the areas around Novotel and Pride Hotel. She was campaigning for the party’s Barasat candidate Swapan Majumdar.

She works for a company that manages the administration of a building in New Town that is rented out to multiple companies.

Being a resident of New Town, she knows about places with more Bengali population or where the majority are Hindi-speaking people.

“We have to speak in different languages accordingly,” she said.

Promita speaks Bengali, English and Hindi, a quality that she uses to her advantage while campaigning.

“Also, the style of campaigning in New Town has to be different from the style adopted in the rest of Rajarhat,” she said.

“In New Town, you have to be soft spoken and need to explain with more accurate facts and figures.”

Coordinating with police to get permissions for rallies was also another important part of the communication strategy, feels Promita.

Biswanath Ghosh Dastidar, 39, son of Barasat Trinamool Congress candidate and sitting MP Kakoli Ghosh Dastidar, said he had been working on the communication strategy.

“I scan newspapers every day and give feedback to my mother on the issues which are being discussed now,” said Biswanath, who has a distinction from Oxford University and is an IVF specialist working at SSKM Hospital.

“This time we are focusing more on my mother as a person, a successful doctor and equally effective MP,” said Ghosh Dastidar.

Profession and passion

Nirban has taken leave for 16 days to work in his mother’s campaign.

“I was working in the election office till 3pm, then went home and had to work till midnight to finish my office assignments. It was like this until I took a break for about a fortnight in the last phase of the campaigning. It was becoming difficult to manage both simultaneously,” Nirban said sitting in the main election office of Mala Roy, near the Rashbehari crossing.

Tamasree, on the other hand, worked from noon to 9pm for office and the rest of her time for the campaign.

“At times, I was working with the digital campaign team up to 3am,” she said.

Promita has not taken a break. “My office hours are usually from 10am to 6pm, but they often get stretched. I focused on campaigning during the evenings and on Sundays,” she said. “I go back home from my work, freshen up and leave for campaigning.”

Biswanath is also juggling between work and the campaign. “Tuesdays are very busy at the hospital. But the other days I am with my mother after hospital hours,” he
said.