The National Voters’ Day has been celebrated on 25 January across the country since 2011. The sole purpose behind this day is to encourage young voters to participate in shaping the political contours of this country and also cast their votes. This day is known for its focus on a specific theme every year. The theme of 2020 is ‘Electoral Literacy for a Stronger Democracy.’

ECI set up in 1950

This day is also commemorated to mark the foundation day of Election Commission of India (ECI). It is a constitutional body that was set up on 25 January 1950, to conduct free, fair and smooth elections in the country and guarantee universal adult suffrage to the citizens of India of the age of 18 or above.

Voting a basic right

India is a democratic country and voting is the basic right of the people of the country to elect their representatives for parliament and state assemblies that will help to form Union as well as state governments. Every citizen has the right to choose their favourite candidate through the electoral process. Voting in a democracy is considered a sort of freedom to express support or anguish for any candidate or party.

Voters lack enthusiasm

Unfortunately, the percentage of voting is still low in India. Many people don’t turn up because they never understand the value of their votes. Of late Election Commission has taken several steps to encourage voters to cast their votes. The Election Commission of India has made an enormous effort to enrol the eligible voters in India. However, voters’ apathy and lack of education are the reasons behind the low participation of voters in the elections. The positive news is that in some of the state assembly elections, in recent times, women outnumbered men. In spite of this, a lot of work is required to be done to bring voters to the polling booth.

Youngsters show less interest

It is observed that enthusiasm has not found its way to the young voters who have attained the age of 18 years. As per the report, new voters were not showing much interest in getting themselves enrolled in electoral rolls, while their enrolment rate was not encouraging and it is as low as 20 to 25 per cent in certain cases.

One reason behind this slackness is that after the completion of school education at the age of 18, a large number of students move to other cities to pursue higher education or in search of jobs. Therefore, most of them don’t get time to make their voter ID card or many of them don’t go to cast their votes in the elections even if they possess. Most people in India also consider election’s day as a holiday, this mindset must be changed.

The Election Commission of India has been making a large number of efforts to enrol all the eligible voters in the country to transmit a sense of pride as a citizen of India and to encourage them to participate in the electoral process. In order to promote awareness among the people to take part in the electoral process such programmes like-debates, mock polls, drawing and quiz competitions, a campaign by volunteers to entice voters to go for a vote whenever it is held in their region should be organised and make Indian democratic set up potent.