[Music]
how do you consider yourself as a youth
alright quite fairly representative the
statistics another question kind of easy
who’s the Prime Minister of India right
somewhat of a more difficult question
who’s the MP representing Jeff were
urban all right Rahm churn so let me ask
you a little bit more of a difficult
question how old do you think our prime
minister is 67 how old do you think MP
ger is 61 now let me ask you some
broader questions what is the age to be
considered a youth you don’t have to
answer because the government defines it
for us so there are two definitions one
is the United Nations which defines its
youth policy anywhere between the ages
of 15 to 24 the Indian government being
the Indian government has a different
age it defines its youth policy anywhere
between the ages of 15 to 29 now here’s
another question that I want you to
think about what percentage of India’s
population the 1.3 billion people are
the youth according to the 2011 census
then obviously adjusted for the time
spent below the ages of 29 years old
they are 73% of India’s population 1.2
billion people are below the age of 29
the rest obviously make up so now we
have this huge demographic this mass
population and you would consider or you
would think that the young people are
doing fairly well
it turns out statistically that’s not
the case according to the youth
Commonwealth program it does this Youth
Development Index right and it rates the
countries and how well their young
people are doing in India it’s not so
bright because we are at 0.5 8% that
puts us 98 out of a hundred and 70
countries
we’re behind countries like Ukraine
Pakistan Sri Lanka Bangladesh we are you
know in front of countries like Syria
who’s gone through a civil war for the
past 10 years there’s more according to
the OECD around 30% of India’s youth are
neither working or studying 30% that
wasn’t bad enough the World Health
Organization recently did a survey and
they stated that between the ages of 15
and 24 India has one of the highest
rates of suicides all over the world so
now we have these issues we have these
problems who do we think is responsible
for it
it turns out there is a government ‘ti
we can blame the government so the
government a government of India has the
Ministry of Youth Affairs that’s coupled
up with the sports Affairs Ministry the
ministers the people leading the youth
affairs ministry have been anywhere
between the ages of 46 years old the
youngest to the oldest 76 years old it’s
one of the most understaffed ministries
in the government of India and according
to the 2017 budget
it was allocated 500 crore rupees which
might seem a lot but when you compare to
let’s say the Ministry of a yoosh which
does the yoga programming that ministry
got 1,800 rupees now obviously I’m
biased
I’m a young person I want young people
to succeed so I thought why not you take
someone else’s words better yet why not
you listen to the ministry itself so the
ministry the youth ministry is mandated
to make a youth policy like a basically
a foreshadowing or what their plans are
every year but the last one the latest
one was done in 2014 so they haven’t
done one for three years but
legitimately I copied and pasted what
they said and I know it’s really hard to
read so I’ll try to I’ll try to
summarize it the government of india
admitted that it’s failing in providing
for its youth in their youth policy
outlook so now that I’m talking about
the government I I thought they would be
better to lay out the basics oh I’m
sorry for the quick civics lecture but I
thought this is essential so everyone
knows the Constitution of India here’s
the preamble obviously we the people but
I want to fly want to focus you on two
words that it says in the preamble
Democratic and Republic Democratic right
the people of India elect their
governments by a system of universal
adult franchise adult being 18 years old
in this case it’s popularly known as the
one man or woman one vote meaning that
we have the power to elect our
government to elect a government that
represents us our ideologies are
thinking Republic so this is the
important one since a in which supreme
power the utmost power is held by the
people and their elected representatives
and which has an elected or nominated
president rather than monarch so here’s
the most important part we’re
transferring our part power to people
that we believe represent us our
ideologies what our desires and what our
needs are to the elected representatives
some more quick facts
India is a multi-party system we have
countless parties representing countless
people and their deeds and demands
India is a first-past-the-post system
that’s a very complicated way of saying
whoever gets the most votes wins now
India has a bike bicameral legislature
meaning that our legislature legislature
is divided into two houses the upper
house the Raja Sava which has 250
representatives that again are making
policies and issues related to us India
citizens India’s 1.3 billion people and
then the Lok Sabha which we directly
elect that have 545 members that are
again supposed to be representing the
six hundred and seventy million people
below the ages of 25 and then in States
we have the Vidhan Sabha or the
Legislative assemblies so here’s the
interesting thing to run for a member of
parliament in the Rajya Sabha you have
to be 30 years old so automatically 73%
of India’s population is gone it’s not
eligible to contest for the righteous as
well to run for the Member of Parliament
for Lok Sabha you have to be 25 and to
run for the member of Legislative
assemblies you also have to be 25 again
not in 73 percent but almost more than
half are disqualified from contesting
here’s another fact the 16th Lok Sabha
the one that got elected in 2014 was the
oldest average age of the
parliamentarians elected by the youngest
age more than a hundred and fifty
million new time voters voted in 2014 a
hundred and fifty million
those numbers are enormous the average
age of a parliamentarian is 56 years old
56 years old
now I want to give you some more facts a
little bit of quick figures because
everyone loves economics right so the
youth contribution to the gross national
income right comes around 34 percent so
anywhere between this
Indian government statistics below the
age of 29 because that’s what they
consider youth contribute 34% to the
gross national income in 2014 when we
when the new Parliament was elected
there were only 2.2 percent of anywhere
below the ages of 29 representing us
sadly now and 2018 in all of India there
is one individual one MP that’s below
the age of 29 what so what we believe is
that there’s a lack of youth
representation which results in litical
little political priority to serve to
the needs the desires the demands for
the use so there’s this age bias that’s
preventing India’s progress by
suppressing again the biggest
demographic the biggest electorate
here’s a fact and this is according to
the 2011 census 670 million people are
below the age of 25 take that number out
that’s the third largest country 670
million people so what do we want to do
what if we decrease the age of a Member
of Parliament and a member of
Legislative assemblies from their ages
of 25 to something lower 21 18 how about
that now
when I say this and when I put this out
people question it right and the reason
that I really talk about this is because
Indians love comparing India to other
countries whether it’s promoting India
itself or complaining about India so
let’s say would you consider the United
Kingdom developed would you consider it
Germany developed
would you consider Russia developed
would you consider Australia develop now
some of these countries have their own
problems but fairly we do so I thought
why not make it easier so on your right
side you have the median age of
population right the medium
India has the lowest at 27 right and
then obviously at Russia with 39 you
have UK at 40 etc Germany has the oldest
at 46 and on the left side you have the
age of Kanna see and look at that while
having the lowest median age we have the
highest age of candidacy so countries
like Germany that we love to compliment
countries like the UK they’re 18 years
old some something like a developing
country like Brazil is also 18 now I’ve
given this thought process but how do
you exactly go about changing their age
it turns out the system in itself is not
so complicated even though the process
might be first of all you approach the
Supreme Court with a public interest
litigation you ask the court what can be
done if this is possible but they don’t
have the mandate to actually make a
legislation they can only recommend so
what do you do you go to our elected
parliamentarians you go to our elected
representatives and you ask them to
amend only three bills three words right
in articles 84 in articles 173 B and
section 36 2 of the representations of
people Act of 1950 so in these three
instances that’s what we’re asking to
change and how do you do that by a
grassroots and social media campaign to
showcase to these parliamentarians to
showcase to these role ruling
coalition’s that we the youth the young
demographic the 670 million people below
the age of 25
the 73% of 1.3 billion people want a
change they want their voice to be heard
now as always I say this I get a lot of
chuckles I get a lot of doubts on why
shouldn’t happen so I thought I would
kind of address some of these now young
people are not mature experienced enough
so at the age of 21 you are illegible
and have had in previous experiences
been able to take the Ted the UPSC test
which then
gives way to the is IPS ifs officers at
the age of 21 there’s only a six month
training leg follows so technically at
the age of 21 22 23 you can be let’s say
in an IAS officer and a single district
at the most powerful ended individual
bureaucratically at the age of 16 and a
half you can join the army at 17 you can
join the Navy at 18 you can join the
airforce so let me get this straight
your mature experienced enough to go
kill people but you’re not mature and
experienced enough to represent the 670
million young demographic it’s a bit odd
we’ll only promote Dynasty politicians
you know what if Dynasty politicians
dynasts want to come in they’re gonna
come in regardless of what age they come
in at but what this does allow and what
you guys are wearing that we’re very
well aware of is that people below is
people astute people in the collegiate
system in India we have a strong
influence of elections that take place
we have a lot of college leaders that
are able to prosper from that time
period which lead way to people that are
really well connected to the political
system that are outsiders that
collegiate system the collegiate
election system gives them that
opportunity now with the age decreasing
to 21 or potentially 18 those collegiate
leaders can actually contest elections
meaning that they can take that vote
bank that vote base those support that
they have from their college and expand
on that
whereas now when the age is 25 there’s
that three-year gap up through your
disconnect the four-year gap you just
connect that you get and then more
severe problems that exist that need to
be prioritized I don’t really believe in
that because I think this is a need of
the concern our and honestly we’ve had
the same demographic of politicians
leading this country for the past 70
years won’t be the new change the new
ushering of this change bring out new
thoughts mindsets and ideas
so what we believe is that India’s
driving social economic force is its
youth and yet India’s greatest resource
is underrepresented underutilized see
what we want to do is we want to we want
to try to get rid of this ageism this
bias against age that exists so our goal
isn’t to make Parliament or the
Assemblies a daycare where we have
children running around that’s not it
see what we want to do is we want to
make that youth vote bank relevant heard
and our needs and our desires be voiced
in Parliament so that we’re building a
country we’re building a framework for
us we are the future instead of the six
year old the 70 year old political
stalwart that’s been out of touch of
this new India that we call I know I’ve
said a lot and there’s a lot of things
that I’ve pushed out to you and I don’t
expect you to be impressed or or to be
like you know what we should change it
but if there’s one thing that I asked
you to take away from this all from this
entire speech it’s to constantly keep
questioning why 25 thank you
[Applause]
how do you consider yourself as a youth
alright quite fairly representative the
statistics another question kind of easy
who’s the Prime Minister of India right
somewhat of a more difficult question
who’s the MP representing Jeff were
urban all right Rahm churn so let me ask
you a little bit more of a difficult
question how old do you think our prime
minister is 67 how old do you think MP
ger is 61 now let me ask you some
broader questions what is the age to be
considered a youth you don’t have to
answer because the government defines it
for us so there are two definitions one
is the United Nations which defines its
youth policy anywhere between the ages
of 15 to 24 the Indian government being
the Indian government has a different
age it defines its youth policy anywhere
between the ages of 15 to 29 now here’s
another question that I want you to
think about what percentage of India’s
population the 1.3 billion people are
the youth according to the 2011 census
then obviously adjusted for the time
spent below the ages of 29 years old
they are 73% of India’s population 1.2
billion people are below the age of 29
the rest obviously make up so now we
have this huge demographic this mass
population and you would consider or you
would think that the young people are
doing fairly well
it turns out statistically that’s not
the case according to the youth
Commonwealth program it does this Youth
Development Index right and it rates the
countries and how well their young
people are doing in India it’s not so
bright because we are at 0.5 8% that
puts us 98 out of a hundred and 70
countries
we’re behind countries like Ukraine
Pakistan Sri Lanka Bangladesh we are you
know in front of countries like Syria
who’s gone through a civil war for the
past 10 years there’s more according to
the OECD around 30% of India’s youth are
neither working or studying 30% that
wasn’t bad enough the World Health
Organization recently did a survey and
they stated that between the ages of 15
and 24 India has one of the highest
rates of suicides all over the world so
now we have these issues we have these
problems who do we think is responsible
for it
it turns out there is a government ‘ti
we can blame the government so the
government a government of India has the
Ministry of Youth Affairs that’s coupled
up with the sports Affairs Ministry the
ministers the people leading the youth
affairs ministry have been anywhere
between the ages of 46 years old the
youngest to the oldest 76 years old it’s
one of the most understaffed ministries
in the government of India and according
to the 2017 budget
it was allocated 500 crore rupees which
might seem a lot but when you compare to
let’s say the Ministry of a yoosh which
does the yoga programming that ministry
got 1,800 rupees now obviously I’m
biased
I’m a young person I want young people
to succeed so I thought why not you take
someone else’s words better yet why not
you listen to the ministry itself so the
ministry the youth ministry is mandated
to make a youth policy like a basically
a foreshadowing or what their plans are
every year but the last one the latest
one was done in 2014 so they haven’t
done one for three years but
legitimately I copied and pasted what
they said and I know it’s really hard to
read so I’ll try to I’ll try to
summarize it the government of india
admitted that it’s failing in providing
for its youth in their youth policy
outlook so now that I’m talking about
the government I I thought they would be
better to lay out the basics oh I’m
sorry for the quick civics lecture but I
thought this is essential so everyone
knows the Constitution of India here’s
the preamble obviously we the people but
I want to fly want to focus you on two
words that it says in the preamble
Democratic and Republic Democratic right
the people of India elect their
governments by a system of universal
adult franchise adult being 18 years old
in this case it’s popularly known as the
one man or woman one vote meaning that
we have the power to elect our
government to elect a government that
represents us our ideologies are
thinking Republic so this is the
important one since a in which supreme
power the utmost power is held by the
people and their elected representatives
and which has an elected or nominated
president rather than monarch so here’s
the most important part we’re
transferring our part power to people
that we believe represent us our
ideologies what our desires and what our
needs are to the elected representatives
some more quick facts
India is a multi-party system we have
countless parties representing countless
people and their deeds and demands
India is a first-past-the-post system
that’s a very complicated way of saying
whoever gets the most votes wins now
India has a bike bicameral legislature
meaning that our legislature legislature
is divided into two houses the upper
house the Raja Sava which has 250
representatives that again are making
policies and issues related to us India
citizens India’s 1.3 billion people and
then the Lok Sabha which we directly
elect that have 545 members that are
again supposed to be representing the
six hundred and seventy million people
below the ages of 25 and then in States
we have the Vidhan Sabha or the
Legislative assemblies so here’s the
interesting thing to run for a member of
parliament in the Rajya Sabha you have
to be 30 years old so automatically 73%
of India’s population is gone it’s not
eligible to contest for the righteous as
well to run for the Member of Parliament
for Lok Sabha you have to be 25 and to
run for the member of Legislative
assemblies you also have to be 25 again
not in 73 percent but almost more than
half are disqualified from contesting
here’s another fact the 16th Lok Sabha
the one that got elected in 2014 was the
oldest average age of the
parliamentarians elected by the youngest
age more than a hundred and fifty
million new time voters voted in 2014 a
hundred and fifty million
those numbers are enormous the average
age of a parliamentarian is 56 years old
56 years old
now I want to give you some more facts a
little bit of quick figures because
everyone loves economics right so the
youth contribution to the gross national
income right comes around 34 percent so
anywhere between this
Indian government statistics below the
age of 29 because that’s what they
consider youth contribute 34% to the
gross national income in 2014 when we
when the new Parliament was elected
there were only 2.2 percent of anywhere
below the ages of 29 representing us
sadly now and 2018 in all of India there
is one individual one MP that’s below
the age of 29 what so what we believe is
that there’s a lack of youth
representation which results in litical
little political priority to serve to
the needs the desires the demands for
the use so there’s this age bias that’s
preventing India’s progress by
suppressing again the biggest
demographic the biggest electorate
here’s a fact and this is according to
the 2011 census 670 million people are
below the age of 25 take that number out
that’s the third largest country 670
million people so what do we want to do
what if we decrease the age of a Member
of Parliament and a member of
Legislative assemblies from their ages
of 25 to something lower 21 18 how about
that now
when I say this and when I put this out
people question it right and the reason
that I really talk about this is because
Indians love comparing India to other
countries whether it’s promoting India
itself or complaining about India so
let’s say would you consider the United
Kingdom developed would you consider it
Germany developed
would you consider Russia developed
would you consider Australia develop now
some of these countries have their own
problems but fairly we do so I thought
why not make it easier so on your right
side you have the median age of
population right the medium
India has the lowest at 27 right and
then obviously at Russia with 39 you
have UK at 40 etc Germany has the oldest
at 46 and on the left side you have the
age of Kanna see and look at that while
having the lowest median age we have the
highest age of candidacy so countries
like Germany that we love to compliment
countries like the UK they’re 18 years
old some something like a developing
country like Brazil is also 18 now I’ve
given this thought process but how do
you exactly go about changing their age
it turns out the system in itself is not
so complicated even though the process
might be first of all you approach the
Supreme Court with a public interest
litigation you ask the court what can be
done if this is possible but they don’t
have the mandate to actually make a
legislation they can only recommend so
what do you do you go to our elected
parliamentarians you go to our elected
representatives and you ask them to
amend only three bills three words right
in articles 84 in articles 173 B and
section 36 2 of the representations of
people Act of 1950 so in these three
instances that’s what we’re asking to
change and how do you do that by a
grassroots and social media campaign to
showcase to these parliamentarians to
showcase to these role ruling
coalition’s that we the youth the young
demographic the 670 million people below
the age of 25
the 73% of 1.3 billion people want a
change they want their voice to be heard
now as always I say this I get a lot of
chuckles I get a lot of doubts on why
shouldn’t happen so I thought I would
kind of address some of these now young
people are not mature experienced enough
so at the age of 21 you are illegible
and have had in previous experiences
been able to take the Ted the UPSC test
which then
gives way to the is IPS ifs officers at
the age of 21 there’s only a six month
training leg follows so technically at
the age of 21 22 23 you can be let’s say
in an IAS officer and a single district
at the most powerful ended individual
bureaucratically at the age of 16 and a
half you can join the army at 17 you can
join the Navy at 18 you can join the
airforce so let me get this straight
your mature experienced enough to go
kill people but you’re not mature and
experienced enough to represent the 670
million young demographic it’s a bit odd
we’ll only promote Dynasty politicians
you know what if Dynasty politicians
dynasts want to come in they’re gonna
come in regardless of what age they come
in at but what this does allow and what
you guys are wearing that we’re very
well aware of is that people below is
people astute people in the collegiate
system in India we have a strong
influence of elections that take place
we have a lot of college leaders that
are able to prosper from that time
period which lead way to people that are
really well connected to the political
system that are outsiders that
collegiate system the collegiate
election system gives them that
opportunity now with the age decreasing
to 21 or potentially 18 those collegiate
leaders can actually contest elections
meaning that they can take that vote
bank that vote base those support that
they have from their college and expand
on that
whereas now when the age is 25 there’s
that three-year gap up through your
disconnect the four-year gap you just
connect that you get and then more
severe problems that exist that need to
be prioritized I don’t really believe in
that because I think this is a need of
the concern our and honestly we’ve had
the same demographic of politicians
leading this country for the past 70
years won’t be the new change the new
ushering of this change bring out new
thoughts mindsets and ideas
so what we believe is that India’s
driving social economic force is its
youth and yet India’s greatest resource
is underrepresented underutilized see
what we want to do is we want to we want
to try to get rid of this ageism this
bias against age that exists so our goal
isn’t to make Parliament or the
Assemblies a daycare where we have
children running around that’s not it
see what we want to do is we want to
make that youth vote bank relevant heard
and our needs and our desires be voiced
in Parliament so that we’re building a
country we’re building a framework for
us we are the future instead of the six
year old the 70 year old political
stalwart that’s been out of touch of
this new India that we call I know I’ve
said a lot and there’s a lot of things
that I’ve pushed out to you and I don’t
expect you to be impressed or or to be
like you know what we should change it
but if there’s one thing that I asked
you to take away from this all from this
entire speech it’s to constantly keep
questioning why 25 thank you
[Applause]
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