A gender wise break-up of the poling figures released by election commission shows the percentage of female vote when compared to the previous assembly elections rose by around 4%. At a time when both ruling BJP and opposition Congress camps are busy in making claims about their victory, informed sources feel it could be the first time voters vote and the increased voting by female voters that could make a definitive sway in the results.
According to the EC data 75.98% male voters and 74.03% female voters exercised the franchise at the 65,000-plus polling stations. While the male voting percentage was 2.03% more than the 73.95% voting of 2013, Sources in both Congress and BJP informed Free Press, “The around 3 percent jump in the total poll percentage of this assembly poll is largely due to increase in voting by first time voters (young voters) and the female voters. It could have a major say about which way the vote has went in Tuesday’s polls”.
Importantly, out of the 230 seats, the female voters outsmarted the male voters in around 50 seats spread in Mahakoshal, Vindhyan, Bundelkhand and Malwa-Nimar regions. The important seats which witnessed the female voters outnumbering the male voters, included Churhat seat of Sidhi district from where leader of opposition (LoP) Ajay Singh is eyeing fifth straight win, all seats of Satna and Rewa district, Jabalpur North and Jabalpur Cant seats of Jabalpur district, large part of MPCC chief Kamal Nath’s parliamentary seat Chhindwara and almost all seats of naxal affected Balaghat district.
Another important trend emanating from the available data is that percentage of polling in rural constituencies was more than when compared to the figures of voting in fully urban seats. All the top five constituencies where maximum voting was reported, including Ichchawar, Sailana, Amarwara, Sausar and Thandla are predominantly rural seats, where the poll percentage varied between 86% and 91%, while among the five top seats where voting was least, three seats Gwalior, Gwalior East and Bhind were urban seats.
In largely urban districts, including Bhopal and Indore, the voting average stood at 65.40% and 71.44% when compared to the more rural Sehore and Chhindwara districts, where the voting percentage stood at 84.19% and 83.76% respectively. Figures show that in 166 seats out of the 230 seats (72% seats) the voting percentage was over 70%. While the Congress claims that increase in poll percentage is indicative of vote for change, the ruling BJP circles said that whenever the voting percentage has grown (it grew in 2003, 2008 and 2013 polls), the BJP has been the beneficiary.
It is claimed by the BJP government that they had done various programmes and schemes for the betterment and uplift of women, but on the other hand Congress sees that women are annoyed on many fronts, including security and others. With speculation galore at this stage only on 11 December after the counting of votes will we get to learn if the the mama factor had drawn the bhanjis (niece) to the polling booths vote in the assembly election -2018 or was it the Congress’ gussa aata hai that nailed it for them.
