Come out and vote for a change: KTR to techies

Telangana IT Minister K.T. Rama Rao asks IT professionals to make the GHMC polling day a big one, in terms of the turnout in Hyderabad.

IT Minister K.T. Rama Rao taking a selfie with a techie after the interactive session at Phoenix Avance Business Hub in the city on Wednesday.— Photo: Mohammed Yousuf

Hyderabad has close to four lakh employees working in the IT sector! However, the average polling percentage during elections among the IT workforce is being projected as less than 30 per cent. Meaning, be it general, state or local body elections, the techies hardly show any inclination towards exercising their franchise.

On Wednesday, IT Minister K.T. Rama Rao did his best to encourage the IT community to turn out in large numbers for the GHMC elections on Tuesday, February 2. While avoiding direct ‘campaign talk’, the Minister urged techies and their families to vote for the best candidate and make the polling day a big one, at least in terms of the turn out.

The members of Telangana Information Technology Association (TITA), who had organised an interaction session between the Minister and IT employees on Wednesday, pointed out that the turnout of IT workers in similar municipal elections held in Bengaluru last year and general elections, was less than 30 per cent.

The Minister also did his best to allay fears and misconceptions about availability of jobs in IT for workforce from Andhra Pradesh.

“Eighteen months have passed since we formed the government and we continue to grow. The overall IT growth in India was 13 per cent, but the annual IT growth in Telangana was close to 16 per cent. We will continue to take up expansion in the IT field,” Mr. Rama Rao assured. In an attempt to motivate techies and their families to participate in the upcoming municipal elections, TITA members also organised a flash mob ‘Ungli Dance’ after the interaction session.

“We are pretty sure this time around there will be definite improvement in the turnout. To involve techies in local municipal issues, we organised a dedicated IVR line,” said TITA founder and president, Makthala Sandeep Kumar.

Close to 1,000 IT professionals from a host of companies participated in the interaction session with the IT Minister.

Some of the participants, especially women tech developers, asked the Minister whether developers from AP too can be a part of T-Hub. Replying to such queries, the Minister assured that not only from Andhra Pradesh, talented software developers from all parts of the country were part of T-Hub.