AP Social Media Cleaning Up: A Drop in Morphs & Abuses!

There is no denying the fact that Andhra Pradesh has the most intense political climate in Southern India. This is why almost all of India pays close attention to the AP polls. With such high stakes involved, the political warfare is also extremely fierce in the Telugu social media space.

However, over the last few years, social media groups related to AP politics had been sharing morphed images of figures like Chandrababu, Jagan, Lokesh, Pawan Kalyan, and their family members. This became a very ugly trend. Adding to that, extreme abuses were hurled at each other.

While there was an overwhelming need to address this situation, the recently formed NDA government got its priorities straight. The government instigated the police department to take strong action against social media abusers and those who habitually shared morphed pictures.

There was a one-month period when the NDA government and the AP police department went extremely hard against these abusers. This was a deliberate attempt to curb the abusive culture on social media.

At one point, Pawan Kalyan even proposed a social media bill that would regulate the kind of posts made against politicians on social media. This proposal was later strengthened by Union Minister Ashwini Vaishnav.

In light of these constant efforts to fine-tune the social media landscape, things are slowly starting to get better. The volume of morphed images and abuses has drastically dropped, which is a good sign.

The government has made it very clear that they are open to taking constructive criticism but strictly advocate against abuse. The message seems to have been clearly received by the social media groups, given the police action that follows when these lines are crossed.

All in all, it is a welcome change that the Telugu social media spaces are getting cleaned up, and the abusive culture is slowly dying down.