Indian Politics & Policy Volume 3, Number 1, Spring 2020 | Page 96

Indian Politics & Policy
cent turnout in 2014 to 68 percent in
2019 Lok Sabha election. This pattern
is indicative of a broader trend, as this
was the case with other voters as well,
where poor voters saw a 7 percentage
points increase in the voter turnout
from 2014. When we look at turnout
among youth belonging to various
castes, youth from scheduled castes
increased their voter turnout. During
2014, 68 percent of youth from scheduled
castes voted in the election, which
increased by 4 percentage points in
the 2019 Lok Sabha election. A similar
proportion of increase can be observed
among urban young voters as well. In
the 2014 Lok Sabha election, four out of
five young voters from scheduled tribe
communities voted in the election, but
the proportion dropped to a little less
than three out of four during the 2019
Lok Sabha election. This trend was specific
to youth only, as among non-youth
scheduled tribes, there was an increase
of 5 percentage points in its turnout
(Table 1).
The Election Commission of India
and different political parties ran
a campaign to improve voter turnout.
They especially targeted first-time
young voters and urged them to register
as voters. Even Prime Minister (PM)
Narendra Modi in his radio program
Mann ki Baat 4 in January 2019 urged
young people to register as voters. These
programs or campaigns were available
on news and social media platforms.
The data suggest that more than social
media, the news media was more
impactful in motivating young voters
to vote. The data further indicates that
voter turnout among the youth increases
with an increase in the level of news
media exposure among young voters.
However, this systematic increase is
not visible when we look at the impact
of social media on turnout among the
youth (data is available on request from
authors).
b. Youth Electoral Participation
Political participation beyond voting
can be explained through the participation
in various electoral activities such
as door-to-door canvassing for the candidate
or party, distributing pamphlets,
collecting or donating funds, or joining
a procession. Most previous studies
found a lower political participation of
youth as compared to people from other
age groups. 5 Milbrath and Goel studied
the relationship between age and
participation and found that participation
was lowest for young adults, peaks
in middle age, and then falls among the
oldest. 6 The lower engagement in politics
and political activities of youth has
attracted the attention of researchers on
civic culture and theorists who study the
association between age and political
engagement to try and understand the
reason for lower participation among
the youth as compared to adults. Youth
do not engage themselves in the polity
and decision-making process and their
absenteeism in the political system leads
to less attention toward issues concerning
youth. Therefore, Suchowerska emphasizes
youth engagement in politics
and states that in order to break the image
of apathy and make their presence
in the decision-making process and
political system, youth should involve
themselves in politics and express their
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