Elections 2006!!!!!!

I have really been busy for the past 2 weeks. I have been campaining for Lok Paritran party. The experience was amazing to say the least. Before i start all the bla bla bla... here is some info abt the party... the party was started by x-IITans. The party is contesting in 7 constituancies namely Mylapore,T.Ngr,Anna Ngr,Chepauk,1000lights,Villivakam and Mudukalathur. The party symbol chosen for the election was AXE!!!!!
OK now abt my xperiences. Thought i have been a part of the campaign process, it was the last 3days when i dedicated all my time for the campaigning. I did door-to-door campaigning in some parts of T.ngr and West Mambalam supporting the contestant Aravind Seshagiri for T.Ngr. I even stood in front of Tirupathi Devastanam(aka TTD) from 7AM to 11AM distributuing pamphlets to people coming out of the temple. The no of ppl who came to the temple was huge courtesy Akshya Trithi. The response from the ppl was really encouraging and that kept me going. Some of them encouraged us, some sounded concerned and some were indifferent. Apart from door-to-door and distributing pamphlets in prominent places like parks, temples and malls, we also went for a rally that covered a part of West Mambalam. The response has so far been encouraging. My guess is that we shld get atleast 10,000-15000 votes from T.Ngr, which isnt that bad at all for a party that was floated just couple of months back!!! Anyway lets wait and c. I hope my efforts dont go waste.
Now abt wat i feel about the overall TN assembly elections. The pundits predict that this is one of the closely fought elections in the recent times. That explains the reason why the major parties are offering freebies like never before. Can you imagine a major political party promising free TV!!!!!???? Even the rest of the parties are not far behind. The others have promised free 10kg of rice, free 4gms of gold,waiver of all outstanding loans for the farmers 15kg rice + rs.500 and what not. Why is it that no party is ready to concentrate on generating employment of provide good heath care and sanitation and focus on primary education. Anyway until there are ppl who are ready to vote for these freebies, such manifestos will be a part of the election campaign.
One observation that i made while i was campaigning was the tendency of ppl to vote for the party that they think will win the election no matter what the party had done in the earlier regime or would do if it comes to power. People think that if they vote for a party that eventually loses the election, then their vote would be of no use. Shockingly even some of the educated ppl have this thought. Wat a misconception about democracy. Most of them dont realize the power of democracy.
Oops!!!! I am supposed to finish my appraisal form today(the last day.... well obviously ;) ) and i still havent started it. Hope my project manager votes in favour of me during this appraisal ;))))