Twitter Records Over 1 Million Tweets on GST in 3 Days
Digital India has been promoted in India with much vigour and has indeed taken roots in rural and urban India. Fueled by the already ongoing digital revolution, much of everything – from information to entertainment, from banking to market purchases, from conversations to networking, has now shifted online. Arguably, Twitter and other digital platforms of this revolution do go a long way in saving paper and trees.
Digital India was whole heatedly at display during the night of the launch of the Goods & Services Tax (GST) in India on 30 June 2017. Over the weekend that followed, Twitter saw over one million GST-related Tweets (between 30 Jun – 2 Jul 2017) as the whole country flocked to the platform for live breaking news and updates on the launch of GST in India. From #GSTIndia to #GSTForCommonMan, conversations on Twitter echoed the nation’s mood and its temperament towards an event of national significance.
Mahima Kaul, Head of Public Policy and Government, Twitter India said, “Conversations around the launch of the GST exemplify Twitter as the best place for people to connect with what’s happening in India and around the world and express their opinions. The platform witnessed a myriad of perspectives from Indian audience supporting as well as raising their concerns about the same. With more than a million Tweets on GST, we hope the public feedback will help to facilitate greater citizen engagement on the topic.”
As the launch of GST took place at midnight, people took to Twitter to express their opinions and conversations on the platform peaked at 12:30 AM on July 1st with 1.1K Tweets per minute. Top hashtags around the conversation show all sides to the story, including: #GSTCouncil, #GSTIndia, #GST@GoI, #GSTRate, GST, #GST, #GSTsimplified, #IndiaforGST, askGST, #GSTForCommonMan, #HalfCookedGST, #HalfBakedGST.
Image by D. Ramos