Bharatiya Janata Party's prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi on Friday appealed to politicians and prominent personalties from other fields to work towards registration of youths as voters.
Modi made the appeal through micro-blogging site Twitter, asking politicians, Bollywood biggies, cricketers and social and spiritual leaders to work for registration of youths as voters in age group 18 to 24, considered by the BJP as its core constituency.
The Gujarat chief ,inister reached out to prominent voices in the social media, including Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his ardent critic, Minister of State for Human Resource Development Shashi Tharoor.
"Studies point to several 'eligible' voters who a yet unregistered. Are you one of them? Now is time to get registered ASAP," Modi said on his Twitter handle.
"I request prominent voices on social media to promote voter registration among youngsters and strengthen our democracy."
In an appeal to Prime Minister, Modi said, "Dear @PMOIndia (official twitter handle of PM) lets encourage voter registration among 18-24 yr olds. Large number of them are unregistered. EC drive presently underway."
He made individual appeals with the same message to spiritual leaders like the Dalai Lama, Sri Sri Ravishankar, social activist Kiran Bedi, cricketer Sachin Tendulkar, fellow party leader Sushma Swaraj and Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Chouhan.
Bollywood stars Amitabh Bachchan, Anupam Kher, Shah Rukh Khan, Salman Khan, Aamir Khan, Priyanka Chopra, Deepika Padukone, Hrithik Roshan, Akshay Kumar and Preity Zinta, among others, were also requested by Modi.
As per reports, population of youths between 18-23 years, who will be first time voters in 2014, will be 149.36 million. The number is over 20 per cent of the 725 million voters the Election Commision says would be eligible to vote the next year. The BJP is keen to tap this young population.
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