Students from the Velammal Vidyalaya (Annexure), Senior Secondary School in Chennai's Mel Aynambakkam created a 400 sqft sand sculpture at Vivekananda Memorial, Marina Beach on Friday morning in an effort to woo voters to go out there and vote. This comes at an apt time, just ahead of the upcoming state assembly polls set to be held on April 6.
The massive sand art created by the students promoted the idea of Your vote! Your voice! with an image depicting a voter's finger that symbolised the action voters perform when they visit the booths on the polling day. The art also asks citizens to be 'dutiful democrats' and provides the election helpline number 1950 to help people with all the information. "We want to spread awareness among the public to choose their leaders by means of a free and fair election in order to form a good government that looks after its people. People should not skip the polls, they should exercise their right to vote and set a positive example for others. They should vote for the proper development of their state," one of the students from the school shared about why they chose to create the sand structure. It took the students a total of eight hours to complete the entire sculpture. They began at around 11 pm on Thursday night and completed it around 7 am on Friday morning.
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The sand art was unveiled by G Prakash, IAS, Commissioner, Chennai Corporation, (District Election Officer), who congratulated the students and praised their dedication in creating the huge sculpture. The other dignitaries present at the event included Shankar Lal Kumawat, IAS, Joint Commissioner (Education), Meghanath Reddy IAS, Deputy Commissioner (R&F), Greater Chennai Corporation, Sridhar, IAS, Regional Deputy Commissioner (Central), Chennai Corporation, Aari Arujunan (Bigg Boss Tamil 4 title winner) and actor John Vijay.
The students also put up a Rubik's Cube arrangement depicting an electronic voting machine near the sand sculpture. The students added that their main objective of creating awareness among voters was fulfilled and they hope that the people in the state will perform their duties as a citizen on the polling day.
