Seven days ahead of the polls, when the Congress’ star campaigner, Rahul Gandhi, addressed an election rally in Mizoram’s capital, not all young voters were amused. “We were taken there to interact with Rahul. But the meeting ended with the organisers asking us to clap loudly as soon as he finished his speech,” a student in Pachhunga University College in Aizawl had said on that day.However, Rahul’s call for change seems to have worked in his party’s favour in the the state’s Assembly elections. The Mizo National Front (MNF), which was in power for the past 10 years, has been swept away, and the Congress has attributed most of this feat to young voters. “The youth voted for the Congress party. They have grown up in a frustrating atmosphere. They were yearning for a change. I congratulate the young voters and attribute a major part of the Congress victory to those young people who were born after the peace accord of 1986 and cast their votes for the first time,” state Congress president Lalthanhawla told The Indian Express over the telephone from Aizawl on Sunday.The Congress had tried to impress the young voters in the best possible way, promising them several things, including coaching centres for IIMs and IITs, a medical college and an engineering college. “Young and first-time voters must be 15 to 20 per cent of the electorate, and they came out almost 100 per cent to exercise their franchise,” said Lalthanhawla, who is all set to take over as the new chief minister of Mizoram later this week. The MNF, too, had tried to woo the young voters. The regional party had promised them “quality education”, coaching centres for entry into IIMs and IITs, financial support to Mizo research scholars even if they were studying abroad.
