With Plans To Recruit 5 Lakh Social Media 'Warriors', Congress Plans To Create 'IT Cell' Behemoth Rivaling TCS In Size

The Sonia Gandhi led Congress party has announced that it will be recruiting 5 lakh "social media warriors" to take on the "BJP IT Cell".

Former Congress president Rahul Gandhi in a video message yesterday (9 February) urged the youth to join Congress' social media team which he described as an "army of truth" which will defend the "Idea of India".

As per reports, the Congress will initiate a campaign to hire 50,000 office bearers in every district and 4.5 lakh volunteers to assist assist these officeholders.

"After careful scrutiny of those interested, interviews will be conducted to complete the recruitment followed by training to put the project in motion at the earliest", a Congress leader has been quoted as saying.

If Congress' plan to onboard 5 lakh social media operatives indeed materialises, it would make it India's largest IT behemoth.

The five lakh strong social media team will be bigger than the combined employee strength of the Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) - which has around 4.46 lakh employees, almost 54,000 less than Congress IT Cell's proposed strength.

The IT Cell's strength will be over 30 per cent larger than India's second largest private employer Quess Corp which outsources Grey-Collar workers to companies like Samsung, Amazon, Reliance, Vodafone India and Bajaj Finance.

The IT Cell will also be more than double the size of other IT giants like Infosys - 2.43 lakh employees, Tech Mahindra - 1.25 lakh employees and Wipro - 1.75 lakh employees.

It will be similarly larger than Reliance Industries - 1.94 lakh employees and Swiggy which has a delivery personnel strength of 2.1 lakh and 7,000 corporate employees.

The IT Cell will also be larger than India Post which currently has around 4.2 lakh employees.

In the run-up to the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, Congress sought to deploy the services of the now defunct Cambridge Analytica, the UK-based firm that was at the heart of a massive worldwide data breach. Congress party was planning to engage the firm for "data mining of Facebook posts and tweets" and "influencing voter intention" for the 2019 national election. The firm had promised the party a "data-driven campaign".

After suffering a humiliating electoral loss in 2019 Lok Sabha polls, the party renamed the All India Congress Committee (AICC) Data Analytics Department as AICC Technology & Data Cell.

Controversial investment banker Praveen Chakravarty, who faced several allegations of mismanaging the party's 2019 election campaign, was retained as the head of AICC Technology & Data Cell.