Colleges roped in to enrol young voters

Ravinder Saini

Tribune News Service

Jhajjar, July 27

The office of the Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) has roped in government, government-aided and private colleges across the state to register new students as electors during the ongoing admission process for various undergraduate (UG) courses.

Sources said college principals had been asked to submit details of new students to local election office with immediate effect so that their names could be enrolled in the voters’ list. The Department of Higher Education had recently sent a communiqué in this regard to all principals following the directives of the CEO.

“The move aims at ensuring registration of maximum number of first-time voters. A considerable number of voters in the age group of 18 to 21 years miss the opportunity of getting registered with the election office,” said the sources.

Virender, an assistant at the local election office, said separate meetings had been held with the colleges here for registration of new voters. “At the time of admission, college staff will identify students who were not registered voters and fill their personal details in the electoral form before submitting it to the election office. Nodal officers have been appointed in colleges, who will submit the forms on July 31,” he added.

Jhajjar has 6,80,767 voters, including 3,65,693 males and 3,15,074 females. The number of voters in the age group of 18 to 21 years is 23,331, including 16,467 males and 6,864 females.