Uttarakhand elections 2022: A cafe that motivates youth to vote

RUDRAPUR: Opened just six days ago, “Sampoorna -- the democracy cafe' has managed to reach out to thousands of students from as many as 400 educational institutions with an aim to sensitise the urban youth, especially first-timers voter, about the importance of exercising their right to vote in a democratic set-up.

The brainchild of Ashish

Bhatgain

, chief development officer of

Udham Singh Nagar

district, the first-of-its-kind café has been developed under Systematic Voters Education and Electoral Participation (

SVEEP

) along Kashipur highway.

Talking to TOI, Bhatgain said the idea is to spread voting awareness among youth and encourage their participation. "Ambassadors picked up from 25 colleges and National Cadet Corps will get in touch with senior citizens and physically challenged persons to encourage them for voting,” Bhatgain addded.

"Keeping Covid-19 guidelines in mind, a limited number of students are visiting the cafe and being educated about the electoral process through various mediums like puppet shows, musical performances, poetry, short stories, etc. Queries related to the functioning of EVMs are also taken up and everybody is encouraged to trust the electoral process, and come forward to vote,” Bhatgain said. Prateek Kaushik, a BSc student at Shaheed Bhagat Singh College, said, "We have so far reached out to more than 20,000 first-time voters in the district.”

“From a photo gallery wall depicting the evolution of voting process to the details about the firs general elections held in 1952, the café has it all. Also, there are election-related souvenirs like badges, pens, caps, mugs, keyrings and zippers that are distributed among people to create voting awareness. Discussion over free coffee is an added plus.”

District education officer,

Ravi Mehta

, associated with the project, said, "

Youngsters

are engaged in creating voting awareness among elderly people. The focus will be on areas and communities which saw less voting participation in the past assembly elections.”