Despite being a first-time voter, many students of the Central University of Tamil Nadu (CUTN) and Central University of Kerala (CUK) will miss out the upcoming Lok Sabha polls going to be held between April 11 to May 19 as their respective universities' end-semester examination dates clash with that of the election dates.
Although central universities have students from all states, the authorities just considered the poll dates of Tamil Nadu and Kerala respectively but did not consider the fact that the universities have students from across the country. "Election will take place in many states on different dates. As far as the university is concerned, our university has students from different states, we cannot have a single date, which is convenient to everyone. Our exams will commence on April 5 and will conclude on April 16. In Kerala, the election will be held only on April 23. We have decided these dates as per our academic calendar," said M Muralidharan Nambiar, Controller of Examinations, CUK.
On the other hand, the Central University of Tamil Nadu, which has a sizeable population of Malayali and Telugu students, have scheduled exams on April 11 and 23. Kerala, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana will go to the polls on the respective days. In addition, AP will witness both Lok Sabha and Legislative Assembly elections this time.
"We have decided the end-semester examination dates in a meeting attended by all Head of the Departments of our university," said A Ragupathy, Controller of Examinations, CUTN.
Students are complaining about the complete disregard of their opinion despite requesting the authorities in prior. "We have earlier received an email from Controller of Examinations stating that the exams will commence on April 8. It came before the announcement of Lok Sabha election dates. Many students have approached their respective HoDs and requested to exclude the poll dates of their states. Malayali students occupy one-third of the students of CUTN. Many students are from Andhra Pradesh and Telangana. But none has considered our right to vote while finalising the exam dates," said a student, CUTN on the condition of anonymity.
According to Election Commission figures, over 1.5 crore new voters are going to cast their vote for the first time. These 'young voters' constitute 1.66 per cent of the total electors. Kerala has around 2,61,750 first-time voters whereas Andhra Pradesh and Telangana have 5.3 lakh and 6 lakh respectively.
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