Legendary cricketer and Bharat Ratna awardee Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar is set to embark on a new journey as a “National Icon” for promoting voter awareness and education in collaboration with the Election Commission (EC).
As the EC’s next face, Tendulkar finds himself in the company of former Indian President APJ Abdul Kalam, former Indian cricket team captain MS Dhoni, actor Aamir Khan and former boxing world champion Mary Kom.
Kalam was EC’s first “National Icon” in 2010.
The EC hopes to leverage Tendulkar’s popularity among the Indian youth to increase voters’ participation in the forthcoming elections, especially in 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
In an event in Delhi, the EC will sign a three-year memorandum of understanding (MOU) with Tendulkar in the presence of Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar and Election Commissioners Anup Chandra Pandey and Arun Goel.
The signing ceremony will take place on August 23.
In a statement, the EC said, “This collaboration would mark a significant step towards leveraging Tendulkar’s unparalleled impact with the youth demographic for increasing voters’ participation in the forthcoming elections, especially in General Elections 2024.”
The EC has been associating itself with renowned Indians from various fields by designating them as its “National Icons” to motivate voters for participation in the electoral process. In 2022, the EC nominated Bollywood actor Pankaj Tripathi as the icon. Earlier, during the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, stalwarts such as MS Dhoni, Aamir Khan and Mary Kom had been the EC’s national icons. Tendulkar is widely regarded as one of the finest batters to have played the game. He is the only player to have scored 100 centuries.