After the Greater Chennai Corporation stopped door-to-door visits and switched
to booth-level camps, weekday work and poor awareness have left many camps almost
empty.
Many booths reported very few visitors during the day, with people coming in only
towards the evening. BLOs were allowed to bring just 50 residents each, while many
voters did not know that forms must be submitted by December 4.
In Virugambakkam, BLO Swathy Umashankar said only 200 people returned forms out
of 900 distributed. “Out of 1,400 forms, I still haven’t reached 500 people.
Awareness is growing slowly. We are sending assistants street by street and
calling residents. Since it’s a working day, people come slowly. It’s a challenge
to finish by December 4. We’ll have to wait for the weekend,” she said.
Turnout was also low in Royapuram, Old Washermenpet, and Tondiarpet. A booth in
Old Washermenpet stayed empty till 2:30 pm. BLO Yamuna said only 200 out
of 1,530 voters returned the forms, and about 700 forms still need to be
distributed.