Wherever you go in Kolar, it’s hard to miss the message asking you to vote. It’s everywhere — from all Nandini Dairy products, KSRTC bus tickets, garbage trucks, MGNREGA job cards to hospital vouchers.
Kolar District Systematic Voters’ Education and Electoral Participation (SVEEP) Committee led by Y.S. Ukesh Kumar, Chief Executive Officer of Kolar Zilla Panchayat, has taken innovative measures to create voter awareness this election season.
Kolar usually sees a relatively high voter turnout — 81% in 2018 Assembly polls — and this time, the SVEEP committee aims to ensure the turnout crosses 85%.
District SVEEP Committee has tied up with Kolar District Co-operative Milk Producers Union Limited (Komul), and over 55,000 families using Nandini products every day are getting packets of milk, curd, ghee with messages like ‘My vote is my future’ ‘I will vote on May 10’, ‘Nothing like voting, I vote for sure’.
Nandini has taken up the ‘Voting Friendly Nandini’, with a tagline ‘Nandini’s concern in the festival of Democracy.’ 2,48,795 Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) Job cards also have similar messages.
Letters to parents and soldiers
Electoral Literacy Clubs have been constituted in every school and college of the district and all the 2,29,565 students have now written letters to their parents exhorting them to use their right and vote in the upcoming elections.
Meanwhile, Mr. Kumar has personally written to all the soldiers hailing from the district and posted across the country, appealing them to cast their vote through postal ballot.
In Srinivaspur town which saw a low voter turnout, the committee has taken up a door-to-door campaign giving a rose to people asking them to cast their vote.
“Amidst constraints over financial resources, we have taken several innovative measures to improve voter turnout. We have targeted first-time voters, and we have achieved 100% enrollment of sex workers, transgenders, persons with disabilities and nomads. We aim to achieve 85% turnout this year,” said Mr. Kumar.
