1.8 lakh voters in 5 Kerala constituencies unaware of candidates and polling date

Be it a street vendor, a random pedestrian or a veteran party worker, the people of Kerala are often lauded for their political consciousness. However, a recent survey conducted by a political startup reveals that this may not entirely be true.

A survey conducted by Insight Political Strategists and Workforce (IPSW) in five Lok Sabha constituencies in the state reveals that a significant number of people do not know when the date of polling is, or who their candidates are.

The survey, conducted as part of the Ente Mandalam Ente Abhimanam (My Constituency My Pride) campaign, was done in Palakkad, Alathur, Thrissur, Chalakudy and Ernakulam Lok Sabha constituencies.

According to the results of the survey, about 1.8 lakh of 5.8 lakh voters who were surveyed did not know who their candidates were. 1.9 lakh voters in the five constituencies did not know when the election was scheduled to be held.

About 2.5 lakh voters in the five constituencies were also not aware of the limits of the constituencies or which booth they have to vote in.

According to the IPSW officials, the survey was conducted from March 11 to April 18.

“We covered all 35 Assembly segments in the five Lok Sabha constituencies with the aid of our 85-member taskforce,” Jaivarda, the founder of IPSW, told TNM.

According to Jaivarda, the primary aim of the campaign is to create awareness about the importance of the democratic process of elections.

IPSW has held similar campaigns in Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Tamil Nadu and Karnataka. The maximum number of constituencies to survey was in Kerala.

“Kerala is often acclaimed as a state with high literacy. It is also one of the few states where there has been steadily good voter turnout. In most other states, there is a drastic difference in voter turnout each election time. So, we were very interested to find out what exactly is the situation on ground here. But, in our survey, we could find that a large number of people were not aware of the basic things like the date of polling or name of the candidates,” Jaivarda says.

Agenda for the MPs

IPSW aims to make use of the detailed information collected in the survey to create constituency-wise agendas, which will be presented to the MPs who are elected.

“Our team has mainly covered rural segments, farmers and small shop owners. Apart from understanding their level of electoral awareness, we collected details about basic issues voters face in each Assembly constituency. Even issues in each Assembly segment in one Lok Sabha constituency are not the same. For example, if drinking water is the issue in Ottapalam Assembly segment of Palakkad Lok Sabha constituency, groundwater for domestic needs is the problem faced by Shoranur residents in Palakkad constituency. We hope to share this data with the candidates who win, to create a difference,” says Jaivarda.