THE JHARKHAND STORY NETWORK
Daltonganj, March 19: Many ‘groundlings’ still feel distanced or have been kept at arm’s length in the campaign for more and more voting.
One such example is the labourers who work at the railway godown shed. Here are a little over 500 labours who unload the rakes of cement bags, rice bags, and fertiliser bags from the 58-wagon goods train or the Python goods train having 58+58 wagons.
These people, all adults and voters, have never been approached to help extend support for bringing out more people to vote.
These people miss to voting when goods trains are placed in on the day of polling as none of them can afford to miss their wages of the day.
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These labourers are seen as persona non grata when they can play a good role in boosting the voting percentage.
The second huge lot is of the thelawalas, also bulky voters. But again, no poll campaigner has ever approached them.
It would be a sight to watch if SVEEP managers held a thela march on the streets as part of their campaign for more votes.
In the 2014 Lok Sabha election, a rickshaw rally was organized as part of SVEEP. The rickshaw rally had drawn a positive response.
A thelawala told this correspondent, “Hum log bhi voters hain. Par hum ko poochta koi nahi. Chhota aadmi hone k karan.”
Tractor march can be done as SVEEP in rural areas, suggested many. All thrust is on the urban voters with congenital apathy for voting.
A mix of more voting campaigns in urban and rural areas can help tide over sluggish voting here in Palamu.
