The Shiv Sena might hate Orkut, but unknown to the average Sainik on the street, the party has a massive presence on the online community network. While a simple search will reveal just a couple of “hate-Sena” communities, there are at least 50 that profess their love for the right wing party. Shivaji, Bal Thackeray, his son Uddhav and Jai Maharashtra slogans are hard to miss on Orkut.

And the popularity meter is there for all to see. While the most popular Sena site has over 2,900 members, the three main anti-Sena communities together have just about 600. That tells it all, for even the most trivial of Orkut communities have over 50 members.

On the flip side, one of the anti-Sena sites claims it’s just come back after being taken off the Net “following a string of hate mails”. All three have been hosted by fictitious IDs, which could even be the handiwork of a mischievous kid.

While the Sena has every reason to be furious, hate is nothing new on Orkut. There are even sites dedicated to hating particular persons, like an autocratic boss or a brutal schoolteacher. It is to counter such misuse that Orkut has given subscribers the option to report “abusive content”. The communities that are reported a specific number of times are taken of the site.

So, while it is easy to just barge in and shut down cybercafés from where unsuspecting teenagers might be logging on to Orkut, it is easier to just ask the Shiv Sainiks who are already a part of the site to flag the hate-Sena communities. After all, shutting down Orkut will throw up just one loser in the present circumstances.