Political internships are common in the West, but the concept has caught on only recently in India, especially in the run-up to the 2014 general election. In the past year, an increasing number of students from business schools to engineering and medical colleges have signed up to intern with the country's biggest political parties as they work on their strategies and draft their manifestos. Some digitallysavvy young interns are helping with social media planning as online campaigning gathers pace in the country. "These days we can see a new trend where lots of B-school students are showing interest in interning with political parties and government agencies. In the ongoing summer placement process at various B-schools, many students are choosing this option," says Sidharth Agarwal, Director, Spectrum Talent Management, a headhunting firm.

Most of the country's big political parties are hiring interns as they head for the polls this year. The Trinamool Congress will recruit two interns from the Indian Institute of Management Calcutta to help with communication strategies in the election. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has also hired 40 to 50 interns over the past two to three months, in addition to over a million volunteers, says Arvind Gupta, National Head, Information & Technology, BJP. "Our interns work in areas of research, content and social media. They are from all universities across India - a mixture of graduates and undergraduates - and a few from overseas colleges."

Apart from interns, the BJP also has help from many members of a non-profit organisation called Citizens for Accountable Governance (CAG). Ashwini Anand Pillutla, a 29-year-old banker, has taken a break from his career to help set up CAG with 59 other founders. He worked with Barclays Capital and Merrill Lynch before starting his own venture, to help the BJP prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi.

a"We support Modi as a candidate and we are doing campaign work. We at CAG decided to support the BJP's prime ministerial candidate as we analysed the growth of Gujarat in terms of infrastructure, power and ports. In a democracy, you have to take sides and we went with the BJP," he says.

The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) may be the new kid on the block, but it has already clambered aboard the political intern bandwagon. The party has hired around 60 to 70 students from varied backgrounds such as medicine and engineering since December last year. "We hired 15 to 20 interns every 15 days and they worked with coordinators in the legal team, on electoral analysis, with social media, and conducted door-todoor surveys. They gave 20 hours a week for AAP, without any payment," says Nitin Singh, a software engineer and part of the AAP's Mumbai committee which handles social media for Maharashtra. Gaurav Gupta, an AAP volunteer from Delhi, says students from foreign universities intern for a longer period.

How does a political internship help a young person's career?

Job consultants say it adds considerable value to a resume. "Political interns will be looked at more positively. A stint with a political party will only add value to a resume as it will show that the professional is motivated by the larger objective of the welfare of the country," says Rajiv Burman, Managing Partner at executive search firm Lighthouse Partners.

Analysts say no corporate experience can match that gained from working on political campaigns and public engagement strategies. The exposure helps students during their final placements as campaigning provides valuable lessons in strategy, data analysis, financial planning and marketing strategy. "A finance student will get a practical understanding of fund-raising and spending, which is a crucial activity for every political party. Similarly, a marketing student gets ample opportunity to learn and contribute in the area of marketing and strategy," says Spectrum Talent Management's Agarwal.