Madhya Pradesh to focus on low women voter turnout areas

Although a good turnout of female voters has been recorded in the recent Assembly elections, the Election Commission of India wants to identify areas where the women turnout has been low and reasons for it.

The ECI has issued instructions to states to focus on low women participation areas under the Systematic Voters’ Education and Electoral Participation (SVEEP) plan for the forth coming Lok Sabha elections.

“The overall voting percentage of women remained between 70-73% across the state but some pockets have been identified where the turnout was comparatively low.  Exercise has been started to increase the turnout for the Lok Sabha elections,” said Chief Electoral Officer of the state Jaideep Govind.

“The turn out was low in tribal districts particularly where migration in common like in Ajirajpur
district. But still the department will find out reasons for low turn out in identified pockets,” explained Govind.

“I had communicated with the officers of different departments across the state and issued instructions to them to ensure maximum participation of people in the Lok Sabha election as the voting was only 55% in 2009,” added Govind.

 The women and child development department has been entrusted with the task of identifying the reasons and create awareness among the women to exercise their right to vote.

Sources said that ECI has also sought information from the state about polling agents, number of voters who used voter slip and those who used EPIC to cast their votes. The CEOs of MP, Rajasthan, Chattisgarh, Delhi and Mizoram will meet ECI to share the experiences in a meeting scheduled in the next month.

For the Lok Sabha, the SVEEP plan has already been started and proper attention is being given on revision of voter list.