Voter awareness drive starts at grassroots and community levels

Mysuru: Amid the political slugfest over the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) and voters mapping, awareness drives have started at grassroots and community levels in Karnataka to create awareness.From protests to meetings, workshops and awareness drives, activists and organisations are working towards ensuring that no one is left out of the voters list. Along with resistance, community-level awareness drives are now planned to ensure that no one will miss voting rights.According to MF Kaleem, convener of the Responsible Citizen’s Voice, the NGO will hold a protest on May 30 (Saturday) in the Narasimharaja constituency in Mysuru city. Besides, two meetings are planned in the first week of June on the SIR and voters mapping. “We will finalise our protests against SIR to register our opposition by May 30. Through mosques, we will create awareness among Muslim voters on documents required to retain the names in the voters list,” he said.“In the two meetings at Narasimharaja, we will educate the people on the SIR and what they need to do during the drive,” he said. He stated that a people’s movement is planned against SIR besides submitting a memorandum to the CM to stop this exercise in the state.Vijayakumar, coordinator, State Primitive Tribes Forum, said even today many tribal families do not have a voter ID card. “Once we get guidelines on the SIR, we will work with our people. Many of the tribal families do not have any records on their address or native place. We will seek guidance from the tribal welfare department to help such families,” he said.Backward Classes Awareness Forum convener KS Shivaramu said it is the voters from the socially weaker sections of society who are targeted through the SIR. “Hundreds of families have their votes in one place while they are staying in another place for their livelihood. We are advising people to update their Aadhaar cards to ensure that they will not miss their voting rights,” he said.