West Bengal records strong third gender voter turnout in phase II

The Election Commission said West Bengal recorded a 91.28 per cent turnout among third gender electors in the second phase of Assembly polls, while Puducherry registered the highest overall participation at 91.81 per cent in the recently concluded Assembly elections

New Delhi: West Bengal recorded a strong turnout among third gender electors in the second phase of the Assembly polls, with 91.28 per cent of them exercising their franchise, according to the Election Commission.

A total of 1,257 third gender electors turned up in the two phases of the West Bengal elections, with 465 voting in phase I and 792 in phase II.

---

The turnout stood at 56.79 per cent in phase I, while it rose sharply to 91.28 per cent in phase II.

Puducherry, however, recorded the highest overall turnout among third gender electors at 91.81 per cent in the recently concluded Assembly polls. The poll body said Puducherry has 139 third gender electors, of whom 91.81 per cent exercised their franchise.

Tamil Nadu has 7,728 third gender electors, out of whom 60.49 per cent voted during the April 23 polls.

In other states, Assam has 343 third gender electors, registering a turnout of 36.84 per cent, while Kerala has 277 third gender electors, recording a turnout of 57.04 per cent.

Polling in Tamil Nadu took place on April 23, while elections in Kerala, Assam and Puducherry were held on April 9. West Bengal went to the polls in two phases on April 23 and April 29.

The counting of votes for all the Assembly elections will take place on May 4.

In the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, more people enrolled themselves in the voters’ list under the ‘third gender’ category, but only 27 per cent of them turned up at polling stations.

According to data issued by the poll authority, 48,194 people were eligible to vote as third gender electors in 2024, compared to 39,075 in 2019, marking an increase of 23.5 per cent over five years. However, only 13,058 of them exercised their franchise, which comes to 27 per cent of the total registered third gender electors.

Former Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Navin Chawla had pushed for allowing third gender persons to register themselves as voters in the ‘Others’ or ‘O’ category, which is now the norm as the Election Commission identifies voters as ‘Male’, ‘Female’ and ‘Others’ or third gender.