Jharkhand Polls: Voter apathy and migrant workers’ return hit Palamu’s turnout
THE JHARKHAND STORY NETWORK Daltonganj, Nov 14: The weather was too good in Palamu on the day of polling November 13.…
District Election Officer cum DC Shashi Ranjan in the queue at Palamu Club booth on the day of polling
THE JHARKHAND STORY NETWORK
Daltonganj, Nov 14: The weather was too good in Palamu on the day of polling November 13. It was a bright sunny day, nevertheless people preferred to remain indoors. They didn’t come to the booths as expected.
Time for reevaluation of SVEEP programs
It’s time now for the ECI to have a relook at the SVEEP (Systematic Voter’s Education and Electoral Participation) programmes. It’s an evil expenditure.
Instead of having gana bajana (music and song) under the SVEEP, there be a village committee at the hamlet level for taking out people to the booth. Cities like Tata and Ranchi also suffered urban apathy much.
Migrant workers’ indifference towards voting
The Jharkhand Story correspondent conducted a late-night anatomy of apathy towards polls.
The correspondent went to the railway station Daltonganj at night and here it was the visible factor of poor voting.
Hordes of migrants were there. They were waiting for their trains to take them away from Jharkhand’s Palamu.
This correspondent spoke to nearly a score of the migrant workers who just said in a very bland tone “Hum ja rahey hain. Hum vote ote nahi diye. Kaa hoga is se. (We are going back. We didn’t vote. What difference our voting will make to us.”
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Migrants deceived the Palamu administration. They came in hordes ahead of Diwali and after Diwali. The officials thought they would stay put here after the Chhath. But it was not so. The migrants packed up without bothering to stay till the day of voting. A large number of them left Palamu on the day of polling and without voting too.
Panchayat bodies’ neglect of migrant voters
Where the administration erred or missed. The Jharkhand Story correspondent tried to delve deep into it.
The panchayat bodies across the district were having a lackadaisical attitude towards the migrants. The panchayat bodies left much to be desired. The district administration had thought the panchayat bodies would be striving hard to help retain the migrants but it was not so.
Voter discontent driven by religious politics and lack of employment
It was so much of Hindu Muslim in the election propelled by high statured politicians that proved disgusting to a common voter. Some voted for religious taste. Some voted in distaste of religion. Many abstained. It’s the one who abstained is to be reached to know why voting was not done.
Meet a tea wala near the railway station. What he said is an eye-opener. “I buy milk for making tea. But it’s not our own Chiyanki milk plant milk. Why? We buy Ashirvad which comes from Bihar.”
This tea wala is unhappy for not finding any small industry even coming up here in Palamu.
“Hindu Muslim card will never fill our belly. We need rural employment. The government does not give us. Why waste time on voting. Let’s rush to Goa where I work” said one Oraon of Chiyanki.
