Illustration: Liu Rui/GT

India's 2014 national election is turning into a mind-boggling display of Facebook feeds, tweets, and YouTube videos.

This is besides the regular television advertisements, banners and mass rallies held by contesting candidates of various political parties.

The political parties have realized the importance of the social media and of the massive youth vote bank who constitute the major players on social networking sites.

India is one of the youngest countries in the world, with 66 percent of the population under 35. And among the 815 million people who are eligible to vote in this year's election, a huge percentage consists of the young electoral vote.

According to the Indian Election Commission, around 23.2 million voters this time are between 18 and 19, and 48.7 million between 18 and 23. This underlines the importance of the young tech savvy voter.

The youth of India are at the forefront of the minds of political decision-makers. With the wave of anti-corruption movements and protests rocking the country in the last two years and giving rise to a much-inspired youth, the politicians have a substantial task at hand.

And this has been mainly due to the growing power of the social media, which has acted like a magic lens for India's news, presenting it to the 93 million Facebook and 33 million Twitter users on a second-to-second basis.

For the last few months, the political parties have been diligently working on improving their electoral chances by going digital.

While young people from urban areas are more prominent, rural youth are involved too. This is because of the increasing usage of mobile Internet in a country where even village grandmothers now often have mobile phones.

The BJP's Narendra Modi and Arvind Kejriwal from the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) have been fighting it out on the social networks, and their Twitter followers reflect their position on ground.

Modi with 3.6 million Twitter followers is taking the lead, with Kejriwal following with 1.6 million followers. This is an accurate depiction of their current standing in the 2014 elections, with the present ruling Congress party losing favor with most voters, not to mention its prime ministerial candidate, Rahul Gandhi, being almost invisible digitally.

The main discussions online range from debates over communal or secular ideology, to greater political accountability and transparency, to development and job creation.

Modi, although the most popular candidate presently, is seen as the anti-secular and pro-communal candidate with his recently released party manifesto supporting these views.

Other discussions online question whether the Congress party's focus on economic growth with significant inflation during its current rule is going to be a continuing trend.

But more significant to the future of social media and politics may be the question of whether the anti-corruption movement turned political party, AAP, will be instrumental in helping in the formation of a governing coalition.

If it really wants to remove the roots of corruption in India, mobilizing the power of Indian youth, via social media and more traditional means, may be its path to a place in government.

The author is a general practitioner and a freelance writer based in India. opinion@globaltimes.com.cn