High PC sales, low time on social media down South

In-person interactions are passe, and India's young is just an imaginary version of the people they are. But nobody's ready yet to unplug to connect.

The HT-MaRs Youth Survey 2014 has revealed an interesting trend in South India — the use of mobiles and the time spent on social media remains markedly low.

“It's probably because they don't substitute social media with daily routines,” says Amaresh Namburi, 28, an engineer residing in Bangalore.

The three Southern Indian towns that were part of the survey — Bangalore, Chennai and Cochin — figured in the bottom five when it came to use of WhatsApp, the most used application according to the survey.

Interestingly, personal computer sales are the maximum in South India.

Moreover, youngsters there may access social media every day, may not even be able to stay away from it for too many days, but they don't spend a lot of time on it.

"They value their real friends more than the virtual ones," says Namburi.

Meanwhile, technology entrepreneur Gagandeep Singh Sapra has a different opinion.

The difference between in the usage could be because of sociological/cultural differences. "There is a lot of focus on family, family values and education," he says attributing the insight to his travels.

"They may be surrounded by tech but, dos and don'ts exist."