(Image source from: Poll battle storms cyberspace})

As 2014 Lok Sabha elections gather steam, political parties are moving on from rallies and yatras and posters and pamphlets to the new age digital media to make their presence felt.

From analyzing sentiments to mustering online support, politicians are leaving no stone unturned to involve online audience as well as woo votes out of cybernatives through digital outreach.

"We've built a strong base of volunteers through our online outreach, who are well-informed about the party policy and its activities. Our social media guidelines, which are up on the party website, were crowd-sourced," says Arvind Gupta of BJP's IT cell.

Kumar Vishwas of Aam Aadmi Party points out, "Not just our central team, even our candidates have online support groups they interact with regularly. When a five-year-old's rape case wasn't being registered by the police, the candidate from the area got people together with a single message. They picketed outside the police station until an FIR was filed."

Social media and technology was used extensively during the 2009 Lok Sabha polls. However, in the past two years, there has been a surge in uptake of digital tools by political parties and members.

“It started with various "official" Twitter handles and Facebook pages trickling in and reached a crescendo with the "#Feku" vs "#Pappu" mudslinging on Twitter. Then there has been a spate of Google Hangouts, which saw policymakers and politicians reach out to the electorate via video conference,” wrote a newspaper.

With an educated audience, it's about time to catapult cyber campaigning to a different level altogether.

AW: Suchorita Dutta