2,000 students to join democracy festival

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The national students’ parliament, a festival on democracy, touted as the first-ever such an initiative in the country, would be held here from February 23 to 25.

It is aimed at bringing the younger generation of voters closer to democracy and political work.

Around 2,000 students from campuses across the country would participate in the event to be organized by the Kerala legislative assembly. Announcing the programme schedule on Friday, Speaker P Sreeramakrishnan told reporters that over 500 students participating in the programme would be from states outside Kerala and among the total number of candidates, as many as 769 would be females.

There would be eight delegations of foreign students pursing courses in various campuses in the country.

“An online mechanism was set up for selection of students. After an initial screening, selected ones were given permission to go ahead with the registration process for which they had to shell out Rs 250. Rather than giving the delegates an opportunity to learn about the proceedings of the House, the focus would be to bring them closer to democratic values and ethos and address directly the oft heard problem of young generation being apathetic to politics,” Sreeramakrishnan said.

The participants will get an opportunity to deliver presentations and express their opinion on several issues the country has been debating and encountering.