Shimla, May 30: Braving rain and stormy weather in several parts of Himachal Pradesh, women voters turned out in significantly higher numbers than men during the third and final phase of panchayat elections on Saturday.
Women outpolled men in all 12 districts of the state, recording a turnout of 68.95 per cent against 56.49 per cent among male voters — a gap of more than 12 percentage points. The overall voter turnout was 62.67 per cent at 1 pm.
Polling began at 7 am and will continue till 3 pm. Till 1 pm, Sirmaur district had the highest voter turnout at 71.28 per cent, while Lahaul and Spiti registered the lowest at 58.61 per cent. No untoward incident has been reported so far.
A total of 15,40,324 voters are eligible to exercise their franchise across 1,189 gram panchayats, said Election Officer Sanjeev Mahajan on Saturday
The elections are being held through ballot papers and not on party symbols.
In the first phase, held on May 26, a voter turnout of 78.90 per cent was recorded across 1,293 panchayats, while 79.88 per cent of voters cast their ballots in 1,276 panchayats during the second phase on May 28.
A total of 10,854 office-bearers have already been elected unopposed.
According to officials of the State Election Department, results for gram panchayats, pradhans, and up-pradhans will be declared on Saturday, while those for panchayat samiti and zila parishad members will be announced on May 31.
The ballot papers are colour-coded: white for ward members, yellow for up-pradhans, green for pradhans, pink for panchayat samiti members and blue for zila parishad members.
Overall, around 50.89 lakh voters will elect 31,182 representatives in the three-phase elections, including 3,754 pradhans, 3,754 up-pradhans, 21,654 ward members, 1,769 panchayat samiti members and 251 zila parishad members.
The Shimla Met office had forecast a wet spell in the state till June 4. (PTI)
