Officers in Mysuru city engaged in spreading electoral awareness have been asked to work out an action plan so that the voting percentage that is poor in urban constituencies here was improved in the ensuing Lok Sabha elections.
The poor voter turnout is a concern in Krishnaraja, Chamaraja, and Narasimharaja constituencies in the city. There has been no significant improvement in the participation of voters in elections with the turnout remaining discouraging since the past elections, including last year’s assembly elections.
This was the topic of discussion at the meeting convened by State SVEEP Nodal Officer P.S. Vastrad, who reviewed the progress made in spreading electoral awareness ahead of the LS polls, here on Saturday.
The task before the officers is to identify the booths that reported poor turnout and take up SVEEP drives in a proactive way, identifying the factors.
Mr. Vastrad told the officers to visit the booths that reported poor voting percentage, identify the reasons, study the reasons and submit a report to him in the next 10 days.
The SVEEP activities have to primarily concentrate on the areas that reported low voter turn-out and that special drives have to be planned for making a larger impact, the officers were told at the meeting.
When compared to the polling in the rural pockets in Mysuru district, urban voters continued to display their apathy, not stepping out of their homes to vote. Nearly 40 per cent of voters in the three constituencies did not vote in last year’s assembly polls contrary to the enthusiasm in rural Mysuru for casting vote which was very encouraging.
Despite SVEEP efforts, voter turnout in Krishnaraja was 59.55 per cent while Chamaraja and Narasimharaja recorded 61.05 per cent and 63.61 per cent voting respectively, in assembly polls.
MCC Commissioner Ashaad Ur Rahman Sharif and senior Zilla Panchayat officials were present at the meeting.
