Thrissur: In the run-up to the Lok Sabha polls, the number of new voters registered in the 18-19 age group in Kerala's Thrissur district has shot up nearly 10 times in just five months.

In the draft electoral roll published last October, Thrissur had 4,658 voters in the particular age group. According to the district administration, the registrations among voters aged 18-19 stood at 40,404 on March 1.

“This was made possible through a series of activities carried out under the leadership of District Collector V R Krishna Teja,” said a senior officer with the office of Deputy Collector (Election), Thrissur. “This was achieved through 83 registration camps organised in various educational institutions and special camps led by village officers to find young voters. Booth-level officers (BLO) conducted house-to-house verification as part of the exercise. Young voters were also encouraged through various activities such as NSS camps, workshops and flash mob programmes.”

According to the officer, the youngsters showed a positive attitude. “As they are technologically advanced, they could complete the enrolling process within minutes. They downloaded the Voters’ Services Portal or visited the website for registering and completed the enrollment in a flash. Now, our responsibility lies in making them cast their votes for which we are launching another set of campaigns,” the officer said.

Every voter is a VIP
The district administration has launched a novel campaign reminding the citizens that every voter is a VIP. The logo of VIP – which stands for Vote is Power – was unveiled by football legend I M Vijayan at the Collectorate the other day. The VIP campaign aims to convince the public to vote.

The video launch of the VIP campaign was done by 109-year-old Vattukulam Veettil Janaki, a native of Puthur, on Wednesday. The video prepared as part of the SVEEP (Systematic Voters Education and Electoral Participation) campaign for the Lok Sabha elections, will be screened at various locations in the city.