The DMK has on-boarded Indian Political Action Committee (I-PAC) as its political consultant/strategist for the upcoming Tamil Nadu Assembly elections in 2021. For this purpose, the DMK has shelled out hundreds of crores to I-PAC, a corporate firm headed by Prashant Kishor who was earlier expelled from JD (U) for anti-party activities. Commoners and many ground level DMK workers have pointed out the brazen hypocrisy as DMK, a party that is anti-Brahmin, anti-Hindu and anti-Hindi has brought the services of a Bihari Brahmin. The DMK chief MK Stalin and I-PAC head Prashant Kishor have already become the butt of jokes with memes flooding the internet.
Now, shocking evidence has emerged on the modus operandi of IPAC that recruits gullible college students in every district as interns to shore up cadres and support for the DMK.
IPAC has been constantly putting out announcements regarding recruitment for its Tamil Nadu unit. Those interested fill in the application form at IPAC’s website. Candidates’ educational and professional information are taken who are then contacted through phone by the IPAC team. Across Tamil Nadu, fresh graduates and college student are targeted and recruited as ‘interns’.
In the audio that has been exposed on social media, a female caller identifying herself as belonging to IPAC calls up a person and can be heard asking if he has a laptop and knows Tamil typing. She says that it is 2 month internship offer and ₹12,000 would be paid as stipend per month. Once recruited, they are given training through Zoom video calling software (considering the pandemic) about their tasks. These interns are supposed to call ‘potential influencers’ in their area to get their support for DMK. From the conversation in the audio, it can be understood that there are interns who also go to the field to identify and rope in influencers too.
Speaking of labour exploitation, the interns are made to call umpteen numbers with no fixed ceiling. The IPAC team member can be heard saying that a set number of influencers have to be identified and it doesn’t matter if one makes 10 calls or 50 calls. The DMK and their Communist friends, who give lectures on exploitation of labour, are right now engaging a corporate company that exploits the labour of poor college students for a meagre amount of ₹12,000.
The intern (a student of SRM college), when asked about if he would like to continue the internship by his supervisor (Gokul), can be heard saying that he finds it difficult to make calls and adds that he has to put up with misbehaviour from callers on the other end. He says that he has been asked to make a minimum of 20 calls per day and get the contact details of influencers in his area. He also says that these numbers are not provided by IPAC but he himself has to call people randomly to ask if the person knows someone who had extended help during the COVID19 lockdown so that they can be asked to give their support for DMK.
This particular intern was asked to approach people in the village areas to identify such people. He can heard saying to his supervisor that people hesitated to share details and asked about whom he was and where did he get their numbers from.
During the Zoom training, interns are told to tell people that they got numbers from their professor/friends. The supervisor tells him that it is not necessary to quote friends/professor but can also say that they got the numbers from the field team who had come for the survey. They are asked to gauge the mindset and interest of the caller in the call and proceed with them on the basis of that.
So, it becomes clear that I-PAC has two teams of interns – one that makes phone-calls to recruit influencers and other that goes into the field to gather such information.
The intern further adds that he never mentions in his calls about I-PAC or that he is engaged in pro-DMK activities.
He tells to the supervisor (Gokul) that he has been told by his team head to leave out those who are part of ADMK, BJP and Congress as well or their sympathizer but look for fence-sitters. He says that he has been trying to approach small community based parties on that basis. The supervisor can be heard intervening to say that he should not approach persons in the area who are offering help officially through their party but can approach those who are other party members but are not active in the party. The intern also says that Congress party is not involved in any such helping activities.
The intern asks if he will be getting a job within Tamil Nadu after this internship to which the supervisor Gokul can be heard saying he himself does not have a clue about what will happen after elections. Finally, the intern asks if this his number (supervisor’s number) as he says that he received a Truecaller notification that said “Thalaivar office” when he was on another call. The supervisor says that he had called from Stalin’s office before.
This is how IPAC and DMK are recruiting gullible college students and youngsters in the name of providing internship for their mission. They are made to call random numbers to identify and rope in influencers who support the DMK’s activities. The DMK-IPAC combo is exploiting the economic vulnerabilities of these youngsters for political propaganda.
This serious issue has not been highlighted by any mainstream Tamil or national media. This daylight exploitation of young minds has to be stopped in the interest of these students and the future of Tamil Nadu.
Here is the audio clip.
https://twitter.com/CTR_Nirmalkumar/status/1279646030380687361
