Uttar Pradesh election: 20 lakh first-time voters to lock their choices

LUCKNOW: About 20 lakh first-time voters will play a key role in deciding the vote of candidates in the assembly elections.

The Election Commission says the number is three times more than 2017 elections. “There is 1.32% rise in the enrollment of 18-19 years voters as compared to 0.51% rise in the previous elections,” the CEC said during his visit to Lucknow recently. As per the ECI data, Prayagraj recorded 62,068 highest number of first-time voters in the state, followed by Ghazipur 60,448, Aligarh 48,748, Bareilly 47,406, Azamgarh 46,604, Budaun 45,497, Jaunpur 43,333, Kheri 42,911 and Bulandsahar 42,129.

Shamli

recorded the least number of first-time voters 10,550, followed by Hamirpur 10,658, Mahoba 10,671, Baghpat 10,802 and Chitrakoot 10,861.

The ECI has registered 52.8 lakh new voters among all age categories, taking the total voters’ count to 15.02 crore.

To cash on the opportunity in the rise of first-time young voters, parties have offered sops for them in their manifesto.

Anil Dubey, national general secretary of Rashtriya Lok Dal, told TOI: “Over 20 lakh young voter base is a segment which no party would ignore. For such voters, our priority would be to ensure quality technical education so that youth could get employment. We will also try to provide one crore job to youth. Further, job aspirants from marginalized communities will not be charged a single penny for government job application.”

Samajwadi Party MLC Sunil

Singh Yadav

said, “We understand that a first time voter is more career oriented and requires gadgets like laptop, tablet, quality education to gain knowledge and compete in order to fetch a job. The Akhilesh government had made huge investment in youth welfare programmes. Youth can turn tables around in polls.”

UP BJP spokesman

Rakesh Tripathi

said, “Our government has been continuously taking steps to create a quality education system by opening medical institutes and promoting technical education. Job opportunities for youth were much more in our regime as compared to any other.”“The 20 lakh first time voters have the wisdom to see the difference between our regime and others,” he added.

(Inputs from Adeeb Walter)