Loyola college students’ union president wins by 7 votes

Chennai: Loyola College on Saturday held its annual students’ union election in which K. Selvakumar of the Commerce department was elected president. It was a closely fought election as the margin of victory was just seven votes. For the third year running, elections were held under the ERP enabled (Enterprise System of Voting) method of voting. Under this system, all 85 polling venues were provided with one laptop each.

Only one student could enter the venue at a time and each student was then given a dummy password and a one-time password using which they could log in and cast their vote for the candidates. The total number of votes polled were also calculated in this process without wasting much time. “The total number of votes polled was 4,730 and the counting was completed within 10 minutes. This was  possible only due to use of the electronic system,” said Alex Parimalam, dean of students.

“This method of voting is eco-friendly as there is no wastage of paper unlike the ballot system. It is also less cumbersome and saves a lot of time. The possibilities of rigging also get nullified to quite an extent,” the dean added. Echoing his statement, Dr K.S. Antonysamy, chief election officer, said it was time the country used technology for its benefit. Meanwhile, a jubilant Selvakumar has already set his mind to work for the welfare of the students.

“I want to introduce further use of technology in classes and turn them to smart classes. There are also many issues which need to be addressed, one among which is the problem of attendance. I wish to sort them out one by one.”