Amidst The Preachy Party Slogans, The Election Commission’s ‘TN 100 Percent’ Emerges Loudest

“It’s fun to be socially active, however, it’s also important to be socially responsible. Register yourself to vote this May,” read a Facebook poster in January. The poster, a part of the ‘Be like Bill’ series, marked the beginning of the Tamil Nadu Election Commission’s poll awareness campaign for the 2016 elections.

The #100percent Campaign

For the TN assembly elections of 16 May 2016, the Election Commission launched their own campaign. It was to create awareness among the electorates and marshalled by Chief Electoral Officer Rajesh Lakhoni, an IAS officer who was formerly the Corporation Commissioner of Chennai.

He set a desideratum of 100 percent both in enrolment and turnout and launched ‘TN 100 Percent’. The campaign went viral among young voters on social media platforms.

Aimed at youth aged 18-29, the posters and videos with popular culture references began to take shape as a part of the campaign. Roughly 23 percent of the voters constitute the youth category and 24 lakh voters are 18-19 years of age group.

The office of the TN CEO, in collaboration with the Chennai-based OPN Advertising agency, took social media as their platform to spread awareness through attractive memes, videos and quizzes in order to get the new voters registered, make the existing voters check if their names are on polls, focus on the importance of ethical voting and lastly, ensure a 100 percent turnout.

The 13-member agency began to work on this unconventional campaign, which required being anything but, sermonizing. Besides custom made, they also invited ‘citizen-made’ posters and videos, to reach and spread the campaign.

Wordplay, wit and videos worked wonders

“It took DiCaprio 23 years to get his name on the Oscar winners’ list, while it’ll take you 15 minutes to get yours on the voters list,” said a quirky meme, indicating the first phase of the campaign, designed for getting youngsters above the age of 18 to register.

The social media platforms organized special chats with Lakhoni (on 15 March on Twitter and on 11 April on Facebook), to clarify all election related queries.

With the social media collaborations clicking well, it was the turn of awareness posters with intelligent humour, witty puns and dialogues by famous Kollywood stars to do their bit.

“Do you remember collecting Looney Tunes freebies, then you must be old enough to vote. Act your age,” says a poster and “Kanna Vote Poda Aasaiya? (Kanna, interested to vote?),” read the other poster, referring to a Tamil movie.

As a part of the campaign, an election related online quiz contest was launched on 28 March on Twitter, with a tagline – ‘Surprise gifts for early bird answers’.

The final phase of the social media campaign named ‘My Vote Is Not For Sale’ was launched on 14 April, the Tamil New Year. This campaign is predominantly meant to emphasise the importance of ethical voting.

Touching the Stars to reach for the Electorates

The virtual buzz has been complimented by film stars and popular cricketers. Popular actors like Suriya, Nasser and Siddharth, along with cricketers like Ravichandran Ashwin, Dinesh Karthik and his wife Dipika Pallikal have shot 30 second videos to spread their share of awareness regarding the campaign.

For example, Ashwin’s video, titled ‘‘Dhoni or Virat – Ashwin Answers’, speaks about the necessary questions that need to be raised at the time of voting. Other videos focus on the inclusivity of the elections, ethical voting and getting the voters to get out of their houses and vote.

No Music means No ‘Sound’

While electrifying music which everyone could relate was the only one missing, a three-minute rap song ‘Vote Podu’, inspired by Bob Marley’s reggae, hip hop and thappattam and rendered by rap artist Blaaze along with music director Paul Jacob was released by the EC. The rapper’s first Tamil number, which captures the pulse of the voters from various sections of the society, aims specifically at the one crore first timers, in a peppy manner.

Moving on to the ‘Real’ Campaign

While social media remains elusive to many, the EC in TN has been doing a phenomenal job on the field as well, in order to achieve 100 percent results.

Lakhoni’s office has introduced 363 ‘Election Facilitation Centres’ across the State, open throughout the week to attend to all the election related queries. Unlike other poll promises, the EC has promised to distribute voting guides to help and decipher the process.

Besides monitoring all the social media accounts of every registered candidate for the first time ever, the EC has partnered with various brands across the State to achieve its turnout target. From advertising on milk packets and carry bags of popular stores in the city to releasing their own merchandise and conducting flash mobs, the EC has done it all!

Why ‘#TN100 Percent’?

The electoral turnout in the State in the 2011 Assembly Elections was a record breaking 75-85 percent, which was higher than the 76.57 percent in 1976 elections.

Despite the glorious turnout, of 4,71,15,846 registered voters, only 3,68,86,226 had voted. Thus, the EC’s aim is to bring the rest to the polling station.