Vadodara: It was not just the disinterest in the civic body polls that did not pull voters to the polling booth but also the scare of contracting Covid-19 that kept the voters at bay.
Although the election commission had made arrangements of giving plastic gloves and masks to voters and also checked voters’ temperature at the entrance, many decided not to take the risk at all.
Richa Awasthi, a culinary art student living in Manjalpur, decided to stay at home despite being an enthusiastic first-time voter during the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. “One of our relatives had contracted virus during voter registration process and so, I decided not to go to the polling centre at all,” she said, adding that she will be travelling to Australia for studies in the coming days and did not want to jeopardize her career plans.
A faculty in English at a concept school, Madhumita Ghosh said that had she been vaccinated, she would have gone to cast her vote. “The virus is rising once again in another state and since I have not been vaccinated, I did not go out to vote,” she said. Ghosh suggested that since everything has moved online due to the pandemic, the election commission should have created a mechanism for voting online.