World’s largest democracy

The results of the elections to the 15th Lok Sabha were announced on 16 May, following a month-long phased polling exercise. Within two hours of the counting, it became clear that the Congress party was galloping ahead, and that the alliance it leads, the UPA, with 262 MPs, would have little trouble garnering 272 seats – the magic number to stake claim to form the government. As drums were beaten and laddoos eaten, Himal began to gather some behind-the-scenes numbers of the largest democratic exercise in the world.

•     Up for grab: 543 contested seats, of which 499 were newly delimited constituencies and 131 were reserved for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes
•    The largest constituency was Unnao, Uttar Pradesh and the smallest constituency was Lakshadweep
•    714 million voters were registered, up from 671 million in the 2004 elections; 24 percent were under 35 years of age, and 48 percent were women
•    828,804 polling centres, up from 687,402 in 2004
•    12,901 new polling stations were set up for villages with less than 300 voters
•    Three officials were deployed for the lone voter living in the Gir forest
•    1,368,430 electronic voting machines (EVMs) were used; prior to the introduction of EVMs, in 2004,
up to 8000 tonnes of paper
were used to print ballots
•    64 candidates could be supported by a single EVM; manual ballots were
used if the number of candidates exceeded this
•    Hikkim, Himachal Pradesh, at 15,000 feet above sea level, was the highest polling station in the world
•    60,000 post-election counting staff members were required, in addition to over two million security personnel and seven million polling personnel on duty; elephants and camels were also pressed into service
•    Except Assam, Nagaland and Jammu & Kashmir, all states used photo electorate rolls, accounting for 82 percent of the electorate