Delhi polls: ‘Mufflerman’ meme breaks the internet

NEW DELHI: Memes, parodies, cartoons and puns — Twitterati had a field day as AAP returned to office with a thumping majority for the third consecutive time in Delhi.
A mini version of Arvind Kejriwal set the tone for AAP’s social media innings on Tuesday, with the party sharing a picture of a young “supporter” dressed as the party chief in his trademark muffler, sweater and glasses.It came with the caption “mufflerman”. The image was an instant hit, becoming viral. The party also shared winning selfies, tweets of gratitude and short video updates as the day progressed and victory became apparent.

#DelhiResults was the top global trend around 6pm on Tuesday with 223K tweets. Several trends around the assembly elections dominated the microblogging site through the day, with #DehiElectionResults (142K) #AAPKiDilli, #AAPWinningDelhi (44.9K) being some of the top hashtags.

Some of the most “mentioned” words that also trended on Twitter were ‘freebies’, ‘India won’ and ‘jeet’ (victory). Manish Sisodia was one of the most talked about politicians as he fought BJP newcomer Ravinder Negi while BJP’s Tajinder Bagga who lost to AAP’s Raj Kumari Dhillon was also a top mention.

AAP, which had carried out an effective social media campaign during the election campaign, also shared old videos. One of them was a slightly altered advertisement of a cement company, where the opposition tries to break “KejriWALL” without any success.
“Thank you Dilli for electing us again. On this #PromiseDay, we promise to serve you with the same zeal for another term. We won't let you down. Dilli, we love you,” AAP tweeted from it’s verified handle around 8pm.
Many tweeple lauded the party for its development work. “This is for @msisodia and @AtishiAAP... On behalf of every child who feels proud to study in a govt school. You guys are real rockstars....am so happy 4 u...am in tears...thank u,” a user who goes by the handle @Komal_Indian wrote.
“In 2013 - @ArvindKejriwal promised cheap water & power. All leaders from BJP & Congress and Political Pundits mocked him. 2020 he fulfilled all promises and now he is all set to become the CM for the 3rd time,” wrote another user Siddharth Setia @ethicalsid.
The party’s Facebook page was active through the day, sharing memes, live videos and updates. In one of the memes, Kejriwal is shown alongside English footballer David Beckham with the message: “Bend it like Beckham, sweep it like Kejriwal”.
On Instagram, the party did not share any new post, but shared several 24-hour long “stories” through the day. One of them asked people to #JoinAAP and put out a phone number for people to give missed calls.