{"id":33937,"date":"2022-12-10T01:43:21","date_gmt":"2022-12-09T20:13:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/?p=33937"},"modified":"2025-06-30T11:14:30","modified_gmt":"2025-06-30T05:44:30","slug":"ec-campaign-to-tackle-urban-voter-apathy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/ec-campaign-to-tackle-urban-voter-apathy\/","title":{"rendered":"EC campaign to tackle urban voter apathy"},"content":{"rendered":"<h3><strong>What\u2019s in today\u2019s article?<\/strong><\/h3>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Why in News?<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>Urban apathy from Shimla to Surat<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>Reasons for urban apathy<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>Steps taken to address urban apathy<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Why in News?<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>After taking note of the low urban voter turnout in the recently concluded elections to HP and Gujarat assemblies, the Election Commission of India (EC) is set to launch a targeted awareness campaign to check &#8216;<strong>urban apathy.\u2019<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Recent trend on urban voter apathy<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>Major cities of Gujarat and HP have not only recorded a decline in voting percentage as compared to 2017 but have also voted much less than the state average.<\/li>\n<li><strong>For example,<\/strong> Shimla recorded the lowest (turnout) at 62.53% (down by 13% points) as against the state average of 75.6%, while the decline in Rajkot West is very sharp at 10.56%, much less than the state average of 63.3%.<\/li>\n<li>There is a <strong>significant gap in voting turnout between rural and urban. For example<\/strong>, the gap of voter turnout is as wide as 34.85% in Narmada district, Gujarat.<\/li>\n<li><strong>The trend is not new<\/strong>, though in the 1st three decades of elections, the relative participation of urban voters was greater, but the gap between urban-rural turnout has widened <strong>since the 1980s.<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><strong>What are the reasons for urban voter apathy?<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Poor urban governance: <\/strong>Though urban India contributes to 60% of GDP and a very high proportion of taxes, the improvement in urban governance has been hindered.\n<ul>\n<li>This is mainly due to the lack of the transfer of power to urban bodies as envisaged in the Constitution\u2019s 74th amendment.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Less mobilization and the need for the intervention of politicians: <\/strong>The rural turnout is positively influenced by a <u>more pronounced emphasis on group mobilization<\/u> and a greater need for the intervention of politicians to compensate for state failure.\n<ul>\n<li><strong>For example, <\/strong>in Delhi\u2019s 2020 assembly election the turnout in New Delhi was almost 20% lower than some constituencies with large slum clusters.<\/li>\n<li>This means, poorer urban Indians still need politicians to improve some services.<\/li>\n<li>However, <u>better-off classes can insulate themselves from civic non-governance<\/u>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Urban apathy is not irrelevant: <\/strong>It\u2019s not apathy or not just apathy that keeps better off city Indians away from voting, it&#8217;s the need of the electoral politics to focus more on the rural areas.\n<ul>\n<li>However, politicians should recognize the divide between city middle classes and elections.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><strong>What are the steps taken to address urban voter apathy?<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>The EC has directed all chief electoral officers to identify such constituencies <strong>to ensure targeted awareness<\/strong> interventions to increase voting percentage.<\/li>\n<li>In 2023, EC will launch the new version of <strong>Systematic Voters&#8217; Education and Electoral Participation (SVEEP), <\/strong>which will target young voters in educational institutions besides voters in corporate offices.\n<ul>\n<li>SVEEP is the flagship program of the EC launched in <strong>2009 <\/strong>for <u>voter education, spreading voter awareness and promoting voter literacy<\/u> in India.<\/li>\n<li>SVEEP\u2019s primary goal is to build a truly participative democracy in India by encouraging all eligible citizens to vote and make an informed decision during the elections.<\/li>\n<li>The programme is based on <u>multiple general as well as targeted interventions<\/u>.<\/li>\n<li>These interventions are designed according to the socio-economic, cultural and demographic profile of the state as well as the history of electoral participation in previous rounds of elections and learning thereof.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>The poll panel is also expected to launch a series of initiatives ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha elections to ensure greater <strong>transparency and accessibility<\/strong> in the electoral system.<\/li>\n<li>These include enabling better information for the voter on &#8211;\n<ul>\n<li>A political party&#8217;s finances, poll promises.<\/li>\n<li>Candidate credentials to consider measures for facilitating voting for NRI voters and domestic migrants.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<h3><strong>Q1)<\/strong><strong>\u00a0Why is it important for citizens to vote?<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>By voting, citizens are participating in the democratic process. Citizens vote for leaders to represent them and their ideas, and the leaders support the citizens&#8217; interests.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h3><strong>Q2) What factors influence voting behaviour in India?<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>The behaviour of voter is influenced by several factors such as religion, caste, community, language, money, policy or ideology, purpose of the polls, extent of franchise, political wave etc.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>ECI to launch a targeted awareness campaign to check urban apathy and low voter turnout.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":33938,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-33937","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-upsc-mains-current-affairs","8":"no-featured-image-padding"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33937","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33937"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33937\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33938"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33937"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33937"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33937"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}