The year 2014 holds a lot of importance for both the BJP and Dhruv Rathee. The parliamentary election of 2014 was significant in more ways than one. Congress was battling corruption charges, policy paralysis and an anti Hindu image where as BJP had by now come out of its Atal-Advani era and its new poster boy was the reigning Gujrat CM and the Hindu Hriday Samrat Narendra Modi. The election results of 2014 established one thing. Narendra Modi had arrived. The BJP won 282 seats 10 more than absolute majority and the only party after Congress to get a full majority on its own, and the Congress suffered its worst defeat. It’s tally shrunk to a meagre 44 seats, its lowest tally ever. Slowly as the BJP consolidated power after winning subsequent assembly elections its hold on the mainstream media also tightened. Most of the news channel slowly but surely started toeing BJP line and it was difficult to differentiate between them as all the anchors and the media channels covered mostly those news that was beneficial to the BJP ,and very little space was given to the opposition voices. With the downward descent of the mainstream media parallel media or social media (particularly) news through social media started getting traction.
At this time a shy young boy all of 19 years from Haryana appeared on scene. His name was Dhruv Rathee. His first Youtube video was about a water park and his subsequent videos were about some other topic but soon his interest veered towards political and social issues. “While the production quality of his videos may still be juvenile and his body language unimpressive, his delivery of words amateurish, but his research was top-notch.” He was different from other Youtubers. While others rushed to break the news to their audiences he and his team researched the topic before making the video. Gradually he started rising up the hierarchy and by 2023 his subscriber base crossed the magic number of 10 million or 1 crore. Very few people had this kind of popularity on social media and his videos on Central Government and PM Modi was making the government jittery. In 2023 through the amended IT act Govt ordered Youtube to remove one of his videos which many people said was the govt’s way of getting back at Dhruv Rathee as he was now directly targeting PM Modi.
This though did not deter Dhruv Rathee and he continued his diatribe against the govt with renewed vigour. The BJP IT cell soon got into the act and started calling him names. He was called German She…., anti India and anti Hindu as he mostly stays in Germany and had also married a German girl. The BJP IT cell was targeting him as his videos were getting views in millions. His recent video “DARA HUA DICTATOR” garnered a massive 2.5 crore plus views
and most of his recent videos have 1 crore plus views and they have all been against the Modi Govt. He has now openly asked for regime change to save democracy in India. The battle lines are drawn and only time will tell who comes up triumph, but one thing is for sure that Dhruv Rathee has managed to do what very few people have managed to achieve. Make BJP jittery.
