CEC expresses concern over urban apathy, appeals to voters to participate in polls

Expressing concern over urban apathy affecting voter turnout, Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar on Tuesday said that polling days in Maharashtra and Jharkhand have been kept mid-week so that more people vote.

Assembly polls in Maharashtra will be held in a single phase on November 20, and in Jharkhand in two phases on November 13 and 20.

The EC has been flagging the issue of low polling in urban centres including those like Mumbai and Pune in Maharashtra, and has been taking a number of steps to increase voter awareness.

In the past, it has been seen that urban voters tend to club weekends with the polling day holiday for getaways, etc, and skip polling.

Kumar appealed to voters in urban areas to participate in elections and said polling days in Maharashtra and Jharkhand have both been kept mid-week so that the issue of urban apathy can be handled.

"We are really really concerned about urban apathy. We want to appeal to all voters in urban areas to come and vote. It is not a healthy trend which is reflected," he said.

"Look at Gurgaon, look at Faridabad, recently, last election Jubilee Hills, Hyderabad, Bengaluru South, Gandhinagar, Colaba, Pune, Thane... all are much below state averages of each state," he said.

"We will be conducting a special meeting of the municipal commissioners in a week's time to appeal again," he said.

In Maharashtra, turnouts in 62 of 64 urban assembly constituencies were less than the state average in 2019, as was the case in Lok Sabha elections, he said, adding "We will have a special drive for urban areas".

He said in the recent Haryana election, there were booths in the "poshest" areas where voting was less than 20 per cent.

"We will do a lot of work on this," he added.