Awareness pushes voter turnout in low-voting areas

A high turnout of 70% in Maoist stronghold of Bastar in Chhattisgarh and a surge in the number of voters in traditionally low-turnout areas show the Election Commission's efforts to persuade more and more people to exercise franchise have worked.

Updated on: Nov 29, 2013, 19:34:34 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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A high turnout of 70% in Maoist stronghold of Bastar in Chhattisgarh and a surge in the number of voters in traditionally low-turnout areas show the Election Commission's efforts to persuade more and more people to exercise franchise have worked.

A-file-phote-of-people-waiting-to-cast-their-votes-at-a-polling-booth-in-Dantewada-during-the-Chhattisgarh-assembly-elections-PTI-photo

The EC for the first time appointed awareness observers in the five-poll bound states. It also identified the polling stations- about 10% of the total-where the lowest voter turn-out was registered in 2008 elections so that it could focus on the reluctant voters there.

"The observers were told to put in an extra effort to make people come out to vote in these areas," a senior election commission official said.

Besides deploying election observers, the EC also reviewed electoral rolls, carried out door-to-door enrolment by its booth-level officer and awareness campaigns to raise the voting percentage, its officials claimed.

Voting data provided by the commission for the three states, where the polling has taken place, shows the strategy had some positive impact.

Just one-fourth of the listed voters came out to vote in 2008 in Maoist-hit Bijapur. This election, the voter turnout was about 50%, despite a boycott call given by Maoists.

The higher voter turn-out was also reported from other Maoist affected areas, with Chitrakot witnessing about 13 percentage point increase and Bastar constituency crossing 83%.

Not only did voter turnout increase in areas with strong Maoist presence, it also went up in areas with little or no presence of Leftwing extremists. The EC had appointed eight awareness observers for the state, which reached there soon after the elections were announced.

Having over a dozen awareness observers in Madhya Pradesh for the areas that reported low polling in 2008 seems to have created an impact. Indore, which recorded just 60% polling in 2008, reported over 70% voting this time around.

Similarly, a higher voter turnout was reported from rural areas in Guna, Gwalior, Dewas and Jabua districts, among others. But urban pockets such as Bhopal did not match the rural enthusiasm.

Even in the north-eastern state of Mizoram, which has witnessed high turn-outs in the past, the appointment of two awareness observers impacted the elections positively. In 2013, half of the eight districts in the state recorded more than 80% polling. Five years ago, just one district touched that mark.

Was the increase in voter turnout due to awareness only? Many in the EC doubt. They say the turnout appears to be high in low-turnout areas because duplications and fake names were removed from their electoral rolls.

"Awareness has an impact, but it cannot result in 10 to 15 percentage point increase in voting," an official said.

The measures, however, would mean increase in polling in Rajasthan, which is going to polls this Sunday and Delhi next week, the EC officials say.

In 2008, Rajasthan recorded 66.25% voting, while Delhi witnessed a dismal turnout of 57.61%.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

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