The Uttar Pradesh government is leaving no stone unturned in raising voter awareness among different sections of society. In one such initiative, the Gonda district administration has launched a special drive aimed at the transgender community, which also includes information on different government welfare schemes.
A large chunk of the transgender community took part in the drive and hailed the move, calling it the first such programme to be conducted in Gonda to make members of their community aware of voting rights.
“Why leave out transgenders, the third gender, when we target all sections while raising voter awareness? So, we thought of holding a programme to make them aware of their voting rights,” said district election officer Neha Sharma, who is the district magistrate.
Gonda Lok Sabha constituency will be voting on May 20, which is the fifth phase of the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. There are 13,50,089 male, 11,82,382 female and 97 third gender voters from this constituency.
There are 7,705 transgenders in UP, who are eligible to vote in the upcoming polls, against a total of more than 48,000 members from the community across India. The number of third gender voters in the 2019 general elections was 39,075 with maximum being from UP (7,797), followed by Tamil Nadu (5,793) and Karnataka (4,826).
District administration officials said the voter awareness programme was conducted under the Systematic Voters’ Education and Electoral Participation (SVEEP) – a flagship initiative of the Election Commission of India (ECI) to raise awareness among voters and to make them aware of their voting rights, ahead of elections.
“Polling is a time to celebrate democracy and, hence, the transgender community was invited to be part of the celebrations. In the programme, an interactive session was organised. Also, an awareness session was held to create voter awareness,” said an official.
During the interactive session, the transgender community highlighted the issue of missing names from the electoral list. “There are times when the names were not included in the electoral rolls, and one often gets discouraged and prefers not to cast their vote,” a member of the transgender community said.
In response to queries and concerns raised, the district administration assured all help and directed officials to include these names and rectify the electoral rolls.
Amruta, a transgender member who led the group, said she will ensure that people from her community come forward and celebrate ‘Chunaav ka parv’, so that the voting output from the community is 100 per cent. Some transgender members also came forward to help the district administration in spreading voter awareness.
Boosting the voting percentage is among the top priorities of the state government. At a recent event, chief minister Yogi Adityanath appealed to all the citizens to pledge 100 per cent voting during the elections. He also directed officials to carry out voter awareness programmes in their regions to ensure 100 per cent voting.
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