He was speaking at a programme organized by the district administration as part of Election Commission of India's 'National Voters' Day' celebrations in Mangalore on Friday.
Stating that there is 'political apathy' among the people of Dakshina Kannada, Mr. Dharma said that voter turnout can never improve till children are told about the power of Indian democracy and political machinery which play a key role in taking the nation forward.
Democratic v/s religious India
“We educate our children in matters of religion but do not impart political education to them. As a result, in the last 65 years, the biggest achievement of ours in political sphere is caste politics. If a politician can claim that party is not as important to him as his caste is, we can estimate as to where we are heading in the years to come. Unfortunately, instead of building democratic India, we have been building religious, caste and ethnic politics brick by brick over the years”, Mr. Dharma said.
In European countries, not participating in voting is considered equivalent to suicide and inferior but people in India are yet to realize the power of their votes. As Indian citizens, we must realize that by not voting, we lose the moral right to point fingers at government officials and elected representatives, Mr. Dharma said.
Dr. Shantharam Shetty, Vice-Chancellor, Nitte University, said in his inaugural address that lack of proper leadership is the reason behind existing poverty, illiteracy and unemployment in India. Reiterating Winston Churchill's words, Dr. Shetty said on the occasion that India is being ruled by people on the basis of caste and nepotism which is unfortunate.
Voter ID cards to a selected few citizens were symbolically distributed.
N Prakash, Deputy Commissioner, Dakshina Kannada, Dr. Harish Kumar, Commissioner, Mangalore City Corporation (MCC), Ravichandra Nayak, Tahshildar, Mangalore, were also present.
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