According to voter turnout data accessed exclusively by TOI, 5,23,822 females stepped out to vote on May 20 as compared to 5,13,167 males in Rae Bareli, while in Amethi, 4,92,861 women voted as compared to 4,83,188 men.
When further analyzed, it was found that 61.42 per cent women exercised their franchise in Rae Bareli, which was 58.1 per cent in 2019, while in Amethi 57.74 per cent women voter turnout was registered against the 56.4 per cent in 2019.
Rae Bareli’s total voter turnout on May 20 was 58.12 per cent (only votes via EVMs), while in 2019 it was 56.12 per cent (only votes via EVMs). With postal ballots, the turnout was 56.34 per cent in 2019.
Similarly, in Amethi, the turnout on May 20 was 54.34 per cent (only votes via EVMs), while in 2019 it was 53.97 per cent (only votes via EVMs). With postal ballots, the turnout was 54.1 per cent .
As per the ECI, in 2019, out of 80 parliamentary constituencies, 37 had registered higher women turnout than men in terms of percentage, but in absolute numbers, only six constituencies — Maharajganj, Sultanpur, Sant Kabir Nagar, Domariyaganj and reserved seats Machhlishahr and Lalganj — saw higher turnout of female voters.
Speaking to TOI, political analyst and veteran scribe JP Shukla said, “It can be assumed that central government schemes focused on women, and political factors of BJP’s Dead Iranians and Congress’s Priyanka Gandhi in the poll campaign attracted more women voters to polling booths.”
However, Anand Vardhan Singh, another political analyst and veteran journalist said, “If central government schemes for women was the reason for higher women turnout in Rae Bareli and Amethi, then by the same logic, the women should have come out more in numbers in the remaining 51 constituencies which went to the polls.”
“We can agree that both Smriti Irani and Priyanka Gandhi along with Sonia Gandhi managed to pull out more women in poll campaigns which resulted in such large women participation in voting,” he added.
Meanwhile, Professor Badri Narayan of G B Pant Social Science Institute, Allahabad, said, “Another factor why large numbers of parliamentary constituencies didn’t register more women participation as compared to 2019 is possibly a belief that the Modi government had a higher chance to repeat, so why step out to vote. But this is just an assumption.”
“One cannot ignore that the star women campaigner from both BJP (Smriti) and Congress (Priyanka) made immense contributions in attracting the women voters,” he added.
According to ECI, the highest voter turnout in numbers was recorded in Ghaziabad (14.69 lakh) and GB Nagar (14.34 lakh).
