Odisha: Sambalpur collectorate had a meeting on election readiness

The Sambalpur administration held a meeting on Thursday at the Collectorate Conference Hall to discuss Systematic Voters’ Education and Electoral Participation (SVEEP) programs in order to assess election readiness.

The conference, which was chaired by collector Akshay Sunil Aggarwal, was attended by shop managers, franchise business outlets, hotels, gas station owners, merchants, and presidents/secretaries of private bus owners associations.

Aggarwal asked everyone in the group to see election day as a “Kartavaya Dina” rather than a vacation. He asked every representative from every institution in attendance to install voter mascots, set up selfie stations with “voter dada” and “voter nani,” SVEEP totems dressed in traditional Sambalpuri clothing, show animated films of the mascots, play the Sambalpuri election jingle at their establishments, and encourage people to cast their ballots. In addition, he asked them to provide voters a reason to visit their location in order to cast their ballots.

The collector was also told to add a QR code to the election mascot posters so that people could scan them to learn more about the facilities that are accessible to them and the voting procedure.

In order to motivate voters to cast ballots, discussions were also made on how to lower urban apathy and raise voter awareness via branding, commercials, and posters. During the discussion, innovative ideas and opinions from members of different universities were exchanged.