On Thursday, 104-year-old K.R. Naidu stepped out of his house after nearly four months. Dressed in a crisp cream veshti and a kurta , he walked resolutely to elect the next government at the Centre.
Like other senior citizens well above ninety years and part of a generation that was witness to the country’s freedom movement, he could not leave it to chance.“As a citizen, I must vote,” said Mr. Naidu, who has been voting since the first elections.
When Pattumani Subramaniyam (91), a resident of SSM Residency, a senior-citizen home at Perungalathur decided to vote, she said that some questioned why she still wanted to vote.
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“I didn’t want to waste my vote. I took some fruits and biscuits assuming it would take time, but we were back very soon,” she said.
“I voted in the elections because it is my political duty. I want a good representative to be elected from Tamil Nadu,” said T. Neelakantan, who is 101 years old, adding that he makes it a point to vote in every election.
T.N. Sukumar, his son, said that even now, his father keenly follows happenings around the country.
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“He reads the newspaper every day. Yesterday, he asked me to take him to vote in the afternoon when the booths would not be crowded,” he said.
97-year old S. Parthasarathy, who voted in Triplicane, recalls that he got his finger inked for the first time in Delhi, during the first elections after independence.
“It was like a carry-over of the independence movement. People were devoted to the cause of nation-building.”
Ninety-four year old A. Krishnan, who voted in T. Nagar, said the factors he considers while choosing a candidate are that they must be corruption-free, able to control price rise and maintain law and order.
“It did not take us much time on Thursday because we didn’t have to stand in a queue at the polling booth,” said K. Rajalakshmi, his wife.
(With inputs from Serena Josephine M.)