Kolkata: State Election Commission has decided to set up pink booths in the forthcoming Panchayat elections which will be managed by women. This is for the first time the State Election Commission (SEC) is going to arrange such booths in the Panchayat elections to encourage women voters to cast their votes.
These booths will be decorated in pink colour. The SEC will decide how many pink booths will be set up in the Panchayat elections this year. There will be many such booths this year, sources said. A similar initiative was taken by the commission during the civic bodies’ poll last year. During civic body elections, these booths were managed by women. Those who cast their votes in these booths were mostly women.
The Election Commission of India arranged pink booths during the Lok Sabha elections in 2019. Panchayat elections will take place on July 8.
According to SEC sources, during the last Panchayat elections, there were around 48,650 seats in Gram Panchayats but this year the number has gone up to 63,229 after the delimitation.
Now, one Gram Panchayat has been allotted against 900 voters. There will be around 9,730 polling centres in 341 Panchayat Samitis while there will be 928 polling centres in 20 Zilla Parishads.