In the middle of the Lok Sabha elections, the YouTuber Dhruv Rathee released a video titled, “Reality of Narendra Modi I How Indians were fooled!” The video criticised the Modi government on several counts and has garnered over 36 million views to date.

Despite all its problems and attempts by the government to control the digital space, Youtuber Akash Banerjee said, it is far more democratic than traditional forms of media. He said that Rathee’s platform had two million subscribers when he was only using a mobile phone to produce his content. “There is no technological cost of it. There is only a human cost,” Banerjee said. “It’s free consumption—anybody who likes you.”

@aathira_vk asked him if he agreed with the argument that YouTubers share part of the credit for the recent Lok Sabha election verdict where BJP’s numbers had reduced. “I would like this to be true but I don’t think this is true because when you live this life, you study the numbers in detail and the numbers say something else,” he replied. “The numbers say that in the rural part of India, you had more anti-BJP vote and you had rejection of the BJP. In the urban areas, BJP’s performance has actually increased. I would like to believe that we are really seen in rural parts of India, which might not be true. 4G is not that revolutionary also. We would largely be seen in the urban parts of India.”

Read the full report on how politicians use influencers to escape accountability: