INTERVIEW / GOVERNMENT “I Am Against Any Kind of Hatred Being Spread”: Sadhavi Khosla, a Former BJP Volunteer, Discusses the Party’s Social-Media Campaigns, Online Trolls, and Why She Left KEDAR NAGARAJAN 05 January 2017 Khosla, a former volunteer of the BJP's digital cell, said the party and its supporters led hateful campaigns against those who opposed the Modi government. AHMER KHAN In her December 2016 book, I Am a Troll: Inside the Secret World of the BJP’s Social Media Army, the journalist Swati Chaturvedi reports on the social media strategy, campaign and cell of the Bharatiya Janata Party, and the online “trolls” that support it. She examines the social-media strategies the party employed during its campaign leading up to the 2014 general elections, and how it has used social media to its advantage since it came to power. In her book, Chaturvedi states that she spoke to more than two-dozen former and current members of the National Digital Operations Centre (NDOC), the BJP’s digital-campaign wing. One such individual is Sadhavi Khosla, a former volunteer who worked for the NDOC for nearly two years, until late 2015. Khosla told Chaturvedi that the NDOC and its heads—including Arvind Gupta, the national convenor of the BJP’s IT cell—ran targeted campaigns over platforms such as WhatsApp and Twitter against those who appeared to criticise the Modi government or the BJP. On this list, Khosla said, were celebrities such as Aamir Khan and Shah Rukh Khan as well as journalists such as Rajdeep Sardesai and Barkha Dutt. According to Khosla, after Aamir Khan commented in November 2015 on alleged acts of intolerance in India, the cell ran a campaign to ensure that he was ousted from his role as the brand ambassador of Snapdeal, an e- commerce platform. She also spoke to Chaturvedi about the methods that the NDOC volunteers used, including threats of physical and sexual violence. Khosla told Chaturvedi that the absence of any reprimand from the BJP leadership for such acts led to her disillusionment with her work. Since the release of the book, several BJP members, including Gupta, have denied Khosla’s allegations, and accused her of lying about her involvement with the BJP. Many have also claimed that she either defected to, or was working for, the Congress party. On 2 January 2017, Kedar Nagarajan, a web reporter with The Caravan, met Khosla, and later continued the conversation over the phone. They discussed the structure and functioning of the NDOC, the work she did, as well as the events that led her to resign. They also spoke about the allegations that have been raised against her. At the beginning of their discussion, Khosla said, “I would not be surprised if my phone is tapped and my activities on the phone are being monitored.” Kedar Nagarajan: What drew you to the National Digital Operations Centre? Sadhavi Khosla: I want to set one thing very straight, I was neither a member nor an employee of the Bharatiya Janata Party—I was a volunteer. I was driven by my passion to be part of a movement that was created at that point in time. In 2012-13, there was a huge anti-establishment wave with the Anna Hazare movement and all that. I think that this was the rst point in time where young Indians—apolitical people and educated Indians—came forward to be part of a political change. The year 2014 was the rst time I registered my voter ID card and chose to vote. (/covid-19?ref=article&id=3355) Advertisement I am the only one in [my] family who supported a non-Congress candidate and I did so because at that point I was listening to my own voice—there was a serious void in the Congress leadership, and so the choices in front of the country were Mr Modi and the Anna movement. I am not a very ideological person; national interests drive me. I feel that for a healthy democracy, things need to rotate and power should never be only in one set of hands. I have lived in the US and seen how rotation works there. Writing is my passion and I used to write on Twitter about the [United Progressive Alliance government]’s failure. That’s what caught the BJP’s attention. I was given a call [by the BJP] asking me to join, and I said no, I would like to volunteer. So they said that we have our Mission 272+ website [the BJP’s campaign for the 2014 elections], go register there and be part of the change. A few days after that, Mr Modi began following me [on Twitter] and he still does. It has been almost three years since. I do not think that any other leader has used social media the way Mr Modi has. KN: What was the nature of the work you did for the NDOC? SK: I helped organise many door-to-door campaigns to increase the volunteer base. I organised many “Chai Pe Charcha” events [an outreach programme launched by the BJP in the run-up to the 2014 general elections]. I helped organise an event for Smriti Irani [the union minister for textiles] and I worked directly on [the BJP member of parliament from Chandigarh] Kirron Kher’s campaign in Punjab. The door-to-door campaigns also bothered me because often these campaigns focused on maligning political opponents, instead of talking about the development intentions. It was, however, a combination of both kinds of rhetoric Advertisement KN: Can you elaborate on the organisational structure of the NDOC? SK: Once I joined in January 2014, I got a call from their Ashoka Road oce [the national headquarters of the BJP, in Delhi]. A person named Vishal Gupta, who was an employee of the BJP, became my daily point of contact. He used to report to Arvind Gupta [the national convenor of the BJP’s IT cell and reportedly the head of the social-media cell until July 2015 (http://pllqt.it/nQzD2O)]. Vishal Gupta is no longer a part of the BJP. He was the one who made me a part of many volunteer [WhatsApp] groups. We would have meetings at our homes, cafes and even at the Ashoka Road oce. There was a lady named Smita Barooah [another volunteer, who was tasked with coordinating women volunteers for the BJP (http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/opinion/smita-barooahs-insider-account- from-right-inside-modis-hectic-campaign/articleshow/35317252.cms)] who has attacked me the most. She is a friend of Arvind Gupta’s from Singapore and she took a sabbatical to come and help at the Ashoka Road oce. I went with her to Chandigarh to work on Kirron Kher’s campaign. [Barooah] came to my house to kickstart the “Chai Pe Charcha” campaign. KN: Barooah posted on Twitter (http://www.rstpost.com/politics/days-after- swati-chaturvedis-book-on-bjps-social-media-tacts-whistleblower-sadhvi-khoslas- credibility-questioned-3179428.html) that you were not a part of the IT cell, and that you did not attend any strategy or management meetings. What is your response? SK: She is bound to make the same claims as Arvind Gupta. I have never said to any reporter that I was any more than a volunteer; I have never claimed to be a member of the BJP or a paid employee of the NDOC. [Barooah] had come to my house to kickstart Chai pe Charcha and together, we hosted 50 other women. All this is proven by the several images and tweets on Twitter (http://www.rstpost.com/politics/days-after-swati-chaturvedis-book-on-bjps- social-media-tacts-whistleblower-sadhvi-khoslas-credibility-questioned- 3179428.html). Moreover, if I never had any involvement and I was nobody, then why does the PM still follow me on Twitter? Advertisement KN: What was the professional background of most of the employees and volunteers at the NDOC? SK: They were all educated people, mostly NRIs [non-resident Indians] that had taken a sabbatical. That was a big motivator: I myself am an MBA with a corporate background, to have people from similar backgrounds motivated by this really charged me up. Everyone was very keen on bringing Modi into power. Mr Modi being the great marketer that he is, he sold the Gujarat model to us very well. We all believed in his [campaign promises o] acche din and good governance. KN: In her book, Chaturvedi mentions that you said that the work you were given was not what you expected you would be doing. SK: I am a very peace-loving person. The only man I follow after god is Mahatma Gandhi. For someone [like me] to become a volunteer in a party where he is hated and abused, and doing something opposite to his ideology, was very disillusioning. I understand that in politics you have to attack your opponent, but spreading hatred in this way is wrong. It is not that I was made to do any work in particular. A volunteer is a perfect person, or what Modi would call a yodha [warrior], because you do not own them. If you read the comments [made publicly by] the members of the BJP in the [the recent days], they all claim that they do not know me. That is very easy for them, because then they are not accountable; because you can then say that they [the volunteers] were all tweeting things according to their own wish. Advertisement What I disliked was that, in those groups, there was continuous hate directed at minorities, some journalists, and anyone else who has opposing views.