Bhopal: Soon after reshuffling its IT Cell, Madhya Pradesh Congress on Monday issued a diktat to all those aspiring for a ticket for the upcoming elections, that they need to get at least 15,000 likes on their Facebook pages and a minimum of 5,000 followers on Twitter.

The order comes close on the heels of state Congress chief Kamal Nath’s reported outburst against the party's IT Cell in Madhya Pradesh for poor performance in an election year. This has also cost Dharmendra Vajpayee his job as the IT Cell head. Congress has replaced Vajpayee with Abhay Tiwari, who led the party’s online campaign during the Gujarat assembly elections last year.

After the change of hands, the party has issued a letter asking all ticket seekers to enhance their presence on social media. News18 has accessed a copy of this letter.

Every candidate in the race for election tickets, will have to have an account on Twitter, a page on Facebook and presence on WhatsApp groups at the booth level in their respective constituencies.

The letter further demands that these Facebook pages must have at least 15,000 likes and 5,000 followers on their Twitter profiles. It is also mandatory for every candidate to like and share tweets and posts of the party's official Facebook and Twitter accounts.

The IT Cell has further directed all party office bearers and sitting MLAs to submit details of their Twitter handle and Facebook pages by September 15.

Reacting to the development, Co-operative Affairs Minister Vishwas Sarang said that the Congress party has completely lost the plot in Madhya Pradesh.

Asked whether Congress was taking a leaf out of PM Modi’s book to take the poll battle to the virtual world, Sarang said that is not the case and the sole reason is that the Congress has lost support in the state.

Abhay Tiwari told News18 that the move was aimed at bringing all party cadre on a common ground for better coordination as it would help the candidates gain attention on local issues with localised content fed to the social media as the party wants to fight these elections on local issues.

Upon questioned whether the move could pose problems for candidates in rural areas, Tiwari retorted saying that these days connectivity is no longer an issue as everyone has android phones and internet.