By Sanket Pathak
New Delhi, Nov 6 (SocialNews.XYZ) As the Election Commission of India (ECI) announced the dates for the Gujarat Assembly elections, the thing to notice here is that voters from the transgender community in the state have doubled since last time, with the majority of them being registered at Vadodara. The community will cast their votes in different Assembly seats.
Gujarat votes in two phases - December 1 and 5.
According to ECI, a total of 4,90,89,765 voters are registered in the state -- 2,53,36,610 male, 2,37,51,738 female voters and 1,417 transgenders, who will exercise their voting rights in the Assembly elections.
More than four lakh disabled voters have also been registered. Many from the transgender community have registered themselves to participate in this year's election process, added the ECI.
The ECI said that the number of voters from the transgender community was around 702 in the last election.
Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar apprised that there has been an increase of 100 per cent in the number of transgender voters as compared to the last polls. He said that the community members have also been appointed as the ambassadors of the ECI.
The data of registered voters for the upcoming elections shows that Vadodara district has the highest number of transgender voters registered at 223. Vadodara has been an important centre of the LGBT activism not only in Gujarat but also in the country. The least number has been recorded at two in Dang district.
Ahmedabad has a total of 211 transgender voters, while Surat has a total of 159. There are 130 transgender voters registered in Anand, 87 in Kheda and 71 in Bharuch. Apart from this, 49 transgender voters are registered in Gandhinagar, 43 in Mehsana, 40 in Bhavnagar, 38 in Navsari, 34 in Rajkot and 32 in Sabarkatha.
Patan and Aravalli districts have 27 registered transgender voters each and Dahod and Surendranagar have 25 each. There are a total of 20 transgender voters registered in Panchmahal and Junagadh districts.
A total of 16 transgender voters are registered in Mahisagar and Banaskantha districts. There are 15 transgender voters in Jamnagar and Valsad, 13 in Dwarka, 12 in Kutch, 11 in Gir Somnath and Porbandar, eight in Chhota Udaipur, five in Tapi and Botad, four in Morbi and three in Narmada.
The ECI's initiative of connecting the transgender community with the election process is worth applauding, as they have encouraged them to vote by using various ways. The commission is putting in efforts to ensure that no citizen is deprived of their right to vote in the biggest festival of democracy.
Source: IANS
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