13 Days Vs 11 Years: A Comparative Study of theOnline Campaigns of Anna Hazare & Irom Sharmila

Abstract

Corruption is an issue of which people everywhere are victims. There are other human right related problems which
go unnoticed when corruption takes the headlines. Irom
Sharmila has been fasting for many years. Media had never
projected her plight for justice except in very few occasions.
At the same time the India Against Corruption Movement
led by Anna Hazare got immense support from the public
through large scale media coverage. This paper is an attempt to analyze how social media reacted to both these
issues by undertaking a Content Analysis of the facebook
pages of “FREE IROM SHARMILA!!!!! REPEAL THE
AFSPA!!!!!” and “India Against Corruption”. The study is
conducted using the posts and comments on both these pages during and after the 13 days fasting of Anna Hazare. The
study reveals that people began to show more interest in the
case of Irom Sharmila after the movement of Anna Hazare.
It is found that Social Media started playing its role in this
Human Right movement too.