E-Paper
Stage set for Pune assembly bypolls today
Women, youth, and the migrant population will decide the fate of Kasba Peth and Chinchwad candidates in today’s (February 26) by-polls
PUNE Women, youth, and the migrant population will decide the fate of Kasba Peth and Chinchwad candidates in today’s (February 26) by-polls. Both the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) saw the by-polls as an issue of prestige, and leaders at the national and state levels from both parties actively participated in the campaign.
The polls were necessitated by the demise of Mukta Tilak and Laxman Jagtap, the BJP’s sitting MPs from Kasba Peth and Chinchwad respectively.
Kasba Peth assembly constituency is the only one among eight seats within Pune city having a higher female electorate compared to male. There are around 2,000 female voters more than men.
Of the total 2,75,679 voters, female voters in Kasba Peth are 1,38,690 and male voters are 1,36,984, according to statistics shared by Election Commission.
In Chinchwad, which has witnessed rapid development, while the overall electorate is around 5.68 lakh, half of them are below 35 years of age.
The polling is scheduled for Sunday while the counting of votes will take place on March 2
As the number of women voters is more in the Kasba Peth, they play an important role in the election process, something the political parties and candidates have also realised. Be it BJP’s Hemant Rasane or Congress nominee Ravindra Dhangekar, their outreach towards women voters was reflected in the campaign.
“Both parties’ candidates had pledged to do as much as they can for women if they were elected,” said Anjali Ramdasi, a voter of Navi Peth area, which comes under Kasba Peth.
In the Chichwad constituency, maximum voters are among those recently settled here who are mostly outsiders working mostly in the IT and automobile sector. The percentage of youth voters is significant in the Chinchwad constituency.
“Due to the migrant workforce settling here in the past decade, Chinchwad has seen massive demographic change. More than 50% of the people here are young and employed,” said Amrit Sharma, an IT engineer and a resident of Ravet.
There are 16 candidates total in the Kasba, plus a NOTA button on the EVM machine. There are 28 candidates altogether in the Chinchwad, plus a NOTA button on the EVM machine.
Though Pune is the educational hub, its voting percentage has always been less. In the 2019 general elections both for Lok Sabha and assemble elections, the voting percentage remained below 55 per cent.
In the 2019 Lok Sabha election, the voting percentage in Kasba was 53.59 per cent and in assembly elections, it was 51.54 per cent.
