The world’s biggest democracy, India, is in the ecstatic mood of election season as political giants take each other head-on for the 543 Lok Sabha seats on offer. As India is one of the most youthful nations in the world, there are expected to be over 13 crore first-time voters this year. Making good use of the occasion and paying regard to the previously mentioned stat, First Time Voter—an initiative me and my friends started recently—organised the inaugural National Youth Parliament event, on April 6, at The Constitution Club, New Delhi to entice the youth ahead of what is arguably the hottest political affair in the world—the Indian General Elections.
The day was kicked off with an inaugural address by Rohit Sikka, the founder of Shatadree, where he shared his thoughts on how and why economic and financial knowledge is a must for making the right political choice. Following this, the first topic ‘Youth should have unfettered right to make choices’ was vivaciously debated by the young and curious participants.
The debaters continued with the same vigour in the second round where the motion was ‘Jobless Growth is a reality’. This was an eventful round where the participants smartly based their arguments on facts and figures.
The third round had the debate participants talking about if 50% parliament must comprise of women—one of the burning topics in Indian politics right now.
The youth parliament resumed with the same energy after the break as the debaters spoke with Mark Antony-esque eloquence on the subjects ‘Free Media cannot control Fake News’, and ‘Forget Climate Change, We want growth’.
To conclude the battle of wordy wisdom, a surprise agenda was disclosed to the young minds as an on-the-spot debate topic. In spite of having little time to prep, the participants did remarkably well in this final round.
Finally, cash prizes were given to the best three speakers among what was a very competitive lot.
Blog of Kartikeya Goel 