Days before International Women’s Day on March 8, 2022, the Election Commission of India (ECI) reported on women’s enthusiastic participation in Assembly elections across five states. While, the gender-wise break-up of votes is still pending for the seventh phase of the Uttar Pradesh elections, the data so far shows that women in Manipur had the highest turnout at 89.94 percent, followed by 80.96 percent turnout of women voters in Goa and 67.2 percent turnout of women voters in Uttarakhand.

During the virtual International Election Visitors Programme (IEVP) 2022 hosted by the ECI, Chief Election Commissioner Sushil Chandra spoke about consistent efforts to ensure the participation of women voters. This included more women polling officers and workers at the voting area  In an earlier press note, the ECI ensured at least one polling station managed exclusively by women in every assembly constituency to prove its commitment towards gender equality. All election staff here, including police and security personnel, were women. Chandra reported that women’s voter turnout in Uttarakhand was 67.2 percent, more than the 62.6 percent men’s voter turnout. Similarly, Goa recorded 80.96 percent women’s turnout as opposed to 78.19 percent men’s voter turnout.

Further, during the sixth phase of UP elections, women voters were 62.62 percent whereas men voters were 51.03 percent. In fact, Times of India reported that UP reported higher women’s voter turnout during the fourth, fifth and sixth phase of state election with the details of the last phase pending. The report also said that Manipur women voters (89.94 percent) led with a 2.74 percent lead as men’s voter turnout was 87.2 percent. However in Punjab, the gender competition was neck and neck with women’s voter turnout at 71.91 percent and men’s voter turnout at 71.99 percent.

Once again, the ECI has not included transgender or non-binary genders in its voting data. In January, The Tribune spoke to the transgender community in Amritsar to highlight how the people are aware of the electoral process but shy away form voting due to social stigma. On the flipside, the Times of India reported in February how transgender person Heena was excited to vote for the first time as her identified third gender. Around March 6, Amar Ujala reported how there were around 42 third gender persons in Uttari and 36 third gender persons in Cantt, but could not replicate the voter turnout post-polling due to lack of data. This indicates both the lack of representation and the continued social stigma faced by the LGBTQ+ community, especially transgender people, in India even though their voting right is acknowledged both by the Indian Constitution and the Supreme Court in 2014.

Across the nation, transgender communities particularly face issues of unemployment, education, access to clean water, toilets of their preferred gender expression and similar facilities and social acceptance.

Grievances of women polling officers

While the ECI boasted how the process was made more accessible to women through focused efforts, workers pointed out that the same attention was not paid to the employees.

Anganwadi workers and ASHAs were put on polling duty throughout elections. Some were asked to check the temperature of voters while others helped people find their respective polling booths. Yet, in all this, anganwadi workers reported they were not paid for their labour. Further they were also not offered food or water unlike the teaching staff and security personnel who had tiffins arranged for them. ASHAs and anganwadi workers had to walk to their assigned voting area. At times, this area was too far to travel by foot but workers said they were not reimbursed for their travel expenses.

An anganwadi worker in Rampur said that the promised payment for election work was less than the ₹700 promised in 2017. However, this year workers did not even receive that. She demanded her due, pointing out that a person should be paid according to the work they have put in.

Similarly, in Gonda, mid-day meal cooks were put on election duty and told to prepare meals for polling officers travelling to the area. Again, these workers were not paid and asked to arrange for any excess raw material themselves. It may be noted that a majority of ASHAs, anganwadi workers and mid-day meal workers are women or widowed women who depend on the meagre government wages for their livelihood. The community has wholly condemned the government for lagging in their payment both during election time and before.

Grievances of Muslim women voters

The Muslim community forms a sizeable chunk of UP’s population. It is thus important to note how the women from this community have faced persisting hate over the years. Most recently RSS-affiliated groups started a campaign to raise the marriage age of Muslim women, citing Shariat laws as dated and hindering progress. This despite earlier criticisms by women’s groups on how a higher marriage age does the bare minimum for women empowerment.

The right-wing group did not address the real trials faced by Muslim women such as communal aggressions in UP since 2017. For example, the labelling of Muslims as traitors by BJP MLAs and veiled comments on Muslim women by none other than Union Home Minister Amit Shah in his oft used phrase of ‘Alia, Malia, Jamalia’. This is also nothing compared to the blatantly sexualised targeting on social media and via apps like S**li Deals and B**li Bai.

Aside from this, the women face great economic threats especially after the Covid-19 pandemic. In CJP’s study titled Purvanchal: Silence of the Looms, women weaver’s who hail from the Muslim community spoke about how they struggled to get work as domestic helps, let alone their primary profession. Weavers in the region estimated a loss of a staggering ₹ 3,000 cr in eastern UP’s handicraft, handloom and power loom business during and after the lockdown. However, it is worth discussing how much this hurt the woman weavers considering their work was unpaid and dismissed as house work.

Aside from these, Muslim children also suffer from malnutrition and poor health. Only recently, anganwadi workers of Bulandshahr reported how they were in a scuffle with the local community due to insufficient nutrition packages for their children.

These realities remind that despite improving representation in the electoral process, the administration is yet to adequately address women’s issues, and therefore, must stop patting its own back for small achievements.

Related:

Purvanchal: Silence of the Looms
Hate Offender: Raghvendra Pratap Singh
UP: No payment for MDM cooks on election duty?
UP: Anganwadi workers demand payment for election duties

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Image Courtesy: AP
 
In 2001, the child sex ratio in Gujarat was 883 girls per 1,000 boys according to Census data. Eighteen years later, the 2019 Lok Sabha voter list has only 575 women per 1,000 men voters in the 18-19 age group. The introduction of sonography machines in the 90s, the sex determination, discrimination and infanticide could possibly change how many women in Gujarat vote in these elections.
 
Children born in the year 2000-2001 who would now have grown up and get counted as first-time voters in general polls, Times of India reported.
 
Sociologist Gaurang Jani said in the report that electoral rolls in Gujarat reflect the big social malaise that has the state in its grips.
 
“This is a failure of the government and society. Young girls are going alarmingly missing from our social fabric,” he said. Chief electoral officer of Gujarat Dr S Murali Krishna said while he cannot comment on the social situation, non-registration of women voters in the marriageable age could be a key reason behind skewed ratio of first-time voters, the report said.

Table Courtesy: Times of India
 
“In rural Gujarat, majority girls are married off young and many change addresses after marriage. Because of this, young women voter’s name gets deleted from their place of birth without it being promptly registered in the new place,” said Chief electoral officer of Gujarat Dr S Murali Krishna in the report.
 
On the contrary, an Indian Express report from February claims women’s voting rights in the state have witnessed a surge. “The number of women voters in Gujarat has hit a new high ahead of the upcoming Lok Sabha elections. The gender ratio of the voters in the state that stood at a record 920 females to every 1,000 male voters about 15 months ago has now climbed to 924 females, as per the final electoral rolls published by the Election Commission a week ago,” the report said.
 
“Ironically, the electoral rolls also highlight the fact that skewed voter sex ratio gets corrected as the age of voter increases. In fact, it does a 180-degree flip as it is highest when women are the oldest. The best is in the 80+ age group which has 1505 women voters per 1,000 male counterparts followed by 70-79 age group which has 1201!” the TOI report said.
 
“Experts say women numbers in the state began declining rapidly after the advent of sonography machines in the 1990s which triggered en masse sex determination and discrimination. A reflection of this can be seen in the voter list which has a healthier voter sex ratio of women above 30 years of age, born before the 1990s. A top public health expert said that a far higher number of women voters in 70-79 and 80 plus age groups also signifies that if left to nature’s devices, women are a stronger gender, biologically. “It is a documented fact that women outlive men as they are healthier with little vices,” says the expert,” TOI reported.
 
During the last Lok Sabha elections in 2014, the gender ratio stood at 913. Thereafter, a record was created in the 2017 state Assembly elections when the gender ratio crossed the sex ratio of the state’s entire population —- 918 (as per the 2011 Census) —- and reached 920 women for every 1,000 male voters. “In the draft rolls released on September 2018, this gender ratio stood at 923. At the beginning of January 2019, it has further improved to 924,” said Dr Murali Krishna, Chief Electoral Officer, Gujarat, while speaking to The Indian Express.
 
“In the last 15 months, while a total of 7,17,234 women got added to the electoral rolls in Gujarat, by January 2019 the number of women voters climbed to 2.14 crore, which is a 3.45 per cent growth compared to the 2.07 crore females who voted during the state Assembly elections. In comparison, only 6,89,668 voters were added during this period. The number of male voters rose only by 3.05 per cent with numbers rising to 2.32 crore from 2.25 crore male voters in 2017. At present, there are a total of 4.47 crore voters in the state,” the report said.
 
 

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