As per the figures released on March 16, there are 999 females per 1,000 in Karnataka, better than the 997 in the final draft released in Jan 2024. However, young voters buck this trend, just as in Jan to touch 858 from 856 two months ago. Skewed ratio among young voters could be for multiple reasons, but as TOI had reported in Jan, it is primarily attributed to poor sex ratio at birth during 2005-06.
Among the 17 constituencies with more female voters than male, Udupi-Chikmagalur — from where BJP removed the incumbent woman MP (Shobha Karandlage) — tops the table with 1,062 women for every male voter, followed by Dakshina Kannada (1,049), Mysore (1,037), Shimoga (1,030) and Mandya (1,029). The other constituencies are Belgaum, Koppal, Bellary, Davangere, Hassan, Chitradurga, Chamarajanagar, Chikkaballapur, Mandya and Kolar.
Among the constituencies that have fewer women than men, those in the Bengaluru cluster have the worst figures. Bangalore Central (938) has the least women per 1,000 men followed by Bangalore South (939), while Bangalore North (947) is tied with Bidar and Bangalore Rural has 966.
Efforts pay off
Election officials attribute the improvement in female enrolment to extensive Systematic Voters’ Education and Electoral Participation (Sveep) activities undertaken by the Election Commission, with a special focus on encouraging women’s participation in the electoral process.
Chief electoral officer (CEO), Karnataka, Manoj Kumar Meena told TOI Tuesday: “All our efforts in trying to enrol every eligible person is showing in the overall ratio and while we’ve seen improvement even among young voters, that figure being significantly lower has also hurt the overall ratio.”
TOI had reported in Jan that at the time of finalising the voter list in that month, the state had around 400 polling booths with zero female young voters registered. Election officials in-charge of voter enrolment said that the 400 was compared to 3,000 such booths when the exercise began. As on date, Meena said, “most of these 400 booths have been covered”.
50k advance applications
While there will be no “revision exercise” of the electoral rolls again before the Lok Sabha polls, election officials will continue updating them.
“Now, there will be no revision. But we will be updating as we’ve asked those people who are turning 18 before March 31 to file their advance application so they can vote in the upcoming elections itself. As on date, we have 50,000 advance applications which are being verified,” Meena said.
He did not rule out the possibility of these applications further boosting the gender ratio. “The last date to file these for those from constituencies going for polling in April is March 25 and we are expecting more applications. This could impact the gender ratio, but it’s too early to say how big the impact would be,” he added.