Citizen groups rally to encourage voter turnout

Ahead of polling day on May 10, members of several residents' welfare associations (RWAs) across the city and organisations have been running voter awareness campaigns to sensitise voters and encourage them to cast their votes.

Some of these groups have also got specially printed pamphlets urging citizens to vote without fail.

Poornima Shetty, president, Rustam Bagh Association for Welfare and United RWA of Konena Agrahara, spoke to DH about ‘Mission 100% Voting’, first launched in Rustam Bagh during the 2018 elections.

“The mission was expanded this year to unite other RWAs, NGOs and active citizens across the city to create a stronger culture of civic engagement and encourage more people to participate in the democratic process,” she said.

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They aim to appeal to the urban voter with specially designed creatives to help them make informed decisions and exercise their votes. “The group consists of 300 odd citizens across the city. We have created over a hundred posters already, which include generic posters and those customised for each locality. There is also a shared link that people can access to print out any posters they want,” she said.

Kochu Sankar, president, Trinity Enclave Residents Association, noted that for the past two months, the association has been helping residents with voter slips and updating their voter IDs. “We also plan to provide additional assistance to voters who might find it difficult to get to the polling booths by themselves. Besides that, we plan on putting a selfie stand so people who have cast their votes can click pictures and also encourage others to do the same,” he said.

Reap Benefit, a Bengaluru-based NGO, is running a campaign ‘#Vote4Future’ to increase political literacy among first-time voters in the state.

Ashish V R, senior program manager at Reap Benefit, told DH that the campaign that was launched on April 28 has a helpline with a toll-free number and a WhatsApp chatbot to answer any queries first-time voters might have.

“A team of five to six young volunteers from Hubballi-Dharwad, Bengaluru and Bhatkal answer queries that come via the toll-free number in both Kannada and English. Over 500 people have already reached out via both call and WhatsApp so far,” he said.