Chapter II: #HoldYourHorses
The popularity of the people's favorite presidential candidate is beginning to raise suspicions. If you want to succeed in politics, be prepared to make enemies.
Karan Mehta sat in her office staring at a nearly completed article on her laptop screen. While sipping on a cup of coffee and eating a samosa from the local deli, she was contemplating the finishing touches she’d put on the article. The article was about the recent campaign of Rahul Desai and how he’s captivated the public by dancing to catchy popular tunes with the hashtag #RahulRocksTheVote, which has gone viral on several social media platforms. The campaign has received mostly positive reactions, with many voters convinced that this young man can bring fresh energy to the government that is sorely needed.
This all started when the popular Sneha Patel posted a video alongside Rahul Desai, where they were giving free food stamps to children in an underprivileged community right beside the village of Chandagram, where Desai currently serves as a sarpanch. The video also signaled Rahul’s intentions to run for Prime Minister, given the new election guidelines for the country. In charge of this campaign, is none other than Aditi Khanna, someone Karan hascovered in the past and is well aware of Aditi’s exploits. Karan had a file on Aditi that was sitting on her desk. Karan was staring at it vigorously as she had her mind on the story.
Vishal, Karan’s male assistant, storms in the room with his phone in hand, and is filled with excitement and enthusiasm.
“Check this out, Boss! Prime Minister could lose to the monkey! If the Monkey wins the cooking showdown, it’ll be the Prime Minister for a week! Think about the clicks!”
Karan immediately throws one of the bitten samosas at Vishal’s face. “Not now, you idiot! I’m working,” Karen rebutted.
Vishal immediately storms out of the room, while Karan shifts her focus back to the screen.
She calls him back.
“What do you know on Rahul Desai?”
“Who?”
“Khanna’s new whipping boy,” Karan said.
“Khanna has a new whipping boy?” replied Vishal.
Karan rolled her eyes and shook her head at Vishal’s incompetence, “Just get me everything you can on him.”
Rahul Desai has been on her mind for quite a while, mostly because of his allegiance to Aditi Khanna.“I am sick of how Khanna uses media exploitation to her advantage. We know how unethical her ways are, yet people are too afraid to stand up to her.. Exposing Khanna and the campaign could be the biggest story of the year, with us leading the charge.”
Motivated and committed, she took a deep breath and started typing away.
#
Meanwhile, Aditi Khanna’s war room buzzed with the frantic energy of a NASA control room. Computer screens flickered with trending hashtags, memes, and sea of viral videos featuring Rahul and his charismatic dance moves. The air was thick with excitement as Aditi and Sneha huddled around a massive touchscreen table. Aditi, armed in her power suit, clutching a coffee in one hand, with a cigarette in the other, pointed to the digital battlefield unfolding before them.
“Thanks to Sneha’s help, our strategy is already proving to be successful. The data shows Rahul is most popular in the group of 18-25.”
“As I said, the younger, the better. Look at all these hearts and thumbs up,” Sneha pointed out.
Sneha, the master conductor of this online orchestra, flashed a mischievous grin. She tapped a button which then showed the campaign’s slogan, #RahulRocksTheVote. A series of videos of young citizens then played, all copying and mimicking Rahul’s dance moves, with some of them even humming to the catchy Bollywood tune.
“My followers are going crazy with this, mid-level influencers are even starting to style their hair similar to yours, Rahul. They’re really happy with what we’ve done so far. This is huge.”“And as you can see, the hashtag is trending nationwide. Even the news are starting to show the videos, and more and more memes are flooding social media every day! You’re getting as much attention as that monkey who’s going to run the country for a week,” Karan said as she blew smoke out of her mouth.
Rahul looked at the screen with eagerness and joy. Never mind the fact that a lot of the things he said were fabricated, as long as it gets him in good standing with the people, and most importantly, the voters. He was scrolling through the comments of his videos when one comment caught his attention.
“What’s this, #RahulExposed?” asked Rahul.
Aditi and Sneha both looked at each other for a brief moment and then shifted their attention back to the screen. “As I mentioned, it’s not going to be perfect all the time. There are some minor bumps in the road we need to get through,” Aditi replied.
Sneha, hesitant for a moment, the colors of the reacts could reflect on her forehead, with the lower part of her face tinted red from the all angry reacts of the video, she then swiped away the videos on the screen, and prompted a new video. The video was parody of one of Rahul’s videos, which was clearly edited to show Rahul dancing beside beggars asking for alms, with the #RahulExposed all over the video.
“What’s that?!” a shocked Rahul asked.
“That’s the work of Choudhary. To be expected,” replied Aditi.
“Amit Choudhary is a rival strategist known for his ruthless tactics. Once he found out that I was behind your campaign, he had no intention of letting it storm off unchallenged. He’sbeen a thorn in my side for quite some time and has shown no signs of stopping anytime soon. Fortunately, I’m always up for a challenge.”
But Rahul felt a sense of uneasiness as he continued to scroll through the different edited videos, and saw the engagement that painted him as an insincere person. Even though he knew the videos were fabricated, his ego took a huge hit. But this is the game he entered willingly. Aditi could sense Rahul’s emotions and wanted to reassure him.
“All part of the game. A minor mishap. It won’t be a huge blow,” Aditi stated.
“Could even be worse,” Sneha pointed out, “remember when he spread the rumor that Tony had a fetish for animals?”
“Oddly enough, his approval ratings improved after that. People love animals. However, with Amit in the picture, he’s probably leading a campaign for someone, which means you have competition, Rahul. The question is, who?”
Even with Aditi and Sneha’s assurance, Rahul was still visibly worried, as they all exited the war room.
Monkey Business is a PepperBerry Publishing Original story.
Text: Zach Iñigo
Illustration: Estela Cen
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