Jan 25 will be celebrated as National Electors Day: CEC
HERALD REPORTER
PANJIM, AUG 31
Chief Election Commissioner Dr S Y Quraishi has said that the Election Commission of India has decided to celebrate January 25 as the “National Electors Day”.
The day will be celebrated every year beginning from January 25, 2011.
Dr Quraisi said that the ECI was established on January 25, 1950 under Article 324 of the Constitution of India and therefore the day assumes great significance to the electors of this country.
He said the electoral system in India has undergone lot of changes and innovations but the core substance and spirit has remained the same. Time has come to document these innovations. One of the innovations, he said, included creation Booth Level Officers (BLO) System which is a very effective one.
Addressing a press conference in Panjim, Quraishi said that an expansive nationwide programme would also be conducted on January 25, 2011 to induct 2 crore youngsters turning 18 that month. “It will be democratic India’s greatest festival”.
“We are celebrating national voter’s day on January 25, when the ECI was founded sixty years ago, one day before the country became a republic,” Quraishi said, while speaking to the media after chairing a conference of chief electoral officers from the west zone, which includes Gujarat, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Goa, Daman and Diu and Dadra, Nagar Haveli.
“We want to give the youth a sense of participation in the election process. This segment (youth) is generally omitted from the voter’s list because very often they are cynical about democratic processes,” Quraishi said.
The CEC also said that a nationwide programme covering 8.5 lakh voting booths across the country would be held on January 25, to award election photo identity cards to 2 crore youngsters, who turn 18 that month, making them eligible to vote.
“The functions will be held simultaneously all over the country on Jan 25,” he said
