The External Affairs Ministry of the Government of India, recently launched an app that brings websites and various social media handles of over 170 Indian missions on a common platform. The initiative (app) that is aimed at increasing the ministry’s public outreach, has been developed in cooperation with Facebook. The idea is to help people connect with Indian missions abroad and the ministry of external affairs through a range of social media platforms under one roof, instead of accessing multiple websites.
“The app is a one stop shop to find social media handles twitter, YouTube and websites of all Indian missions abroad,” external affairs ministry spokesperson Vikas Swarup told PTI, according to a report published on India Today.
Ankhi Das, public policy director of Facebook for India and South and Central Asia, informed that Facebook has made the app for free.
At present, over 165 Indian missions and posts are on Twitter and 172 on Facebook. Of that, over 124 have their websites and many of them have their YouTube channels, said the report.
Instead of searching for websites, Facebook pages and twitter handle of individual mission, people can just tap on the map of the country and immediately all social media platforms of the mission will get flashed on screen. The app, hosted on Facebook pages of MEA and Indian Diplomacy, will help people in distress to contact the missions without any hassles, said Swarup.
The app is also in sync with the activism that our foreign minister. The ministry uses Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, Flickr to reach out to people as part of its social media engagement. “She reaches out to people in need who send out their messages on Twitter,” said Swarup as part of the report.
According to Das, the launch of the app is an example of “consumerization of foreign policy”, offering more power to the citizens.