BHUBANESWAR: Odisha has added nearly two per cent more voters to its electoral roll ahead of the 2024 general elections. Announcing the final publication of the electoral roll, the chief electoral officer (CEO), of Odisha, Nikunja Bihari Dhal on Friday said the state has added 5,81,147 voters this year. Accordingly, the total number of voters, which was 3,26,55,213 till October last year, has now gone up to 3,32,36,360, registering an overall 1.78 per cent growth.
The CEO said after the publication of the draft electoral roll (voter list) last year, a total of 12,97,954 voters, including 4,76,969 young ones in 18-19 age group, were added, while 7,16,807 voters were de-listed. This apart, modifications and corrections were made for another 4,22,638 names. The de-listed figure included names of 3,75,938 deceased 2,71,570 permanently shifted voters and 65,858 repeated names. As per the fresh voter list, the state has 1,68,50,949 male, 1,63,82,031 female and 3,380 transgender voters.
The percentage of young voters in the electoral roll is 2.27 per cent while PwDs is 1.38 per cent. Besides, the percentage of senior citizens in the age group of 80 years and above is 2.06 per cent. Dhal said the task of enrolling more eligible young electors and addressing gender gap in the fresh electoral roll revision has been achieved.
“The percentage of young electors, in the age group of 18-19 years which was around 1.72 per cent of the total electors in 2019 has now gone up to 2.27 per cent. Similarly, the ratio of women voters for every thousand males has gone up from 946 in 2019 to 972 in 2024. This is a major achievement,” he said.