- The Conference will be attended by Municipal Commissioners of Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Ahmedabad, Pune, Thane, Nagpur, Patna Sahib, Lucknow and Kanpur
- The 11 states and UTs – Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Delhi, Maharashtra, Uttarakhand, Telangana, Gujarat, Punjab, Rajasthan, Jammu and Kashmir and Jharkhand – were selected as their turnout was lower than the average national turnout in 2019 of 67.40%
NE NEWS SERVICE
NEW DELHI, APRIL 4
In a first-of-its-kind initiative, the Election Commission of India will organise a conference with Municipal Commissioners and selected District Election Officers from 11 states which had the lowest voter turnout.
The meeting will discuss ways to step up voter turnout in the General Elections to Lok Sabha 2024, on Friday, 5th April, 2024 at Nirvachan Sadan, New Delhi. It will deliberate and prepare targeted and specific action plans to address the issue of low voter turnout in certain urban and rural areas.
The Conference will be chaired by Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar along with Election Commissioners Gyanesh Kumar and Sukhbir Singh Sandhu.
As noticed in the past few assembly elections, CEC Rajiv Kumar on many occasions highlighted the challenge of urban apathy and migration from rural areas as reasons for low participation.
11 States/UTs namely, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, NCT of Delhi, Maharashtra, Uttarakhand, Telangana, Gujarat, Punjab, Rajasthan, J&K and Jharkhand had lower than the national average of 67.40% in the 2019 General Elections to the Lok Sabha. Of the 50 PCs with the lowest voter turnouts, 17 were found to be in Metropolitan areas or major cities reflecting an unfortunate trend of urban apathy. Over 50 rural PCs in 9 states with lowest Voter turnout have been identified for deliberation on specific issues and developing strategy to enhance poll percentage.
The Conference will be attended by Municipal Commissioners of Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Ahmedabad, Pune, Thane, Nagpur, Patna Sahib, Lucknow and Kanpur as well as select District Election Officers of Bihar and Uttar Pradesh. A booklet on voter apathy will also be released by the Commission.
