Bihar Legislative Assembly Elections Update

First Phase of polling concluded

Bihar is the third most populous state of India.  It has 243 Assembly Constituencies. In terms of size, it is among the smaller states.

What are Assembly Elections and Assembly Constituencies?

The State Government is a government that takes care of administration in a single state. The government is elected by demarcating the entire state into smaller areas, called constituencies, and then electing a leader from each of these smaller areas. Each constituency is given a seat in the State Assembly, so it is also called a ‘seat’.

All you need to know about Bihar Elections

• The Bihar Assembly elections will be held in 3 phases – On October 28^th, November 3^rd and 7^th.
• Counting of votes and results announcement is on November 10th.
• Today was the first phase of elections. 71 constituencies chose their leaders today.
• Voting was closed by about 5 pm at most places. The voter turnout reported at this time is 54.39%. Voter turnout is typically around 50% in Bihar. In 2015, this turnout was 56.8%, and in 2010, 52.7%.
• The highest voter turnout was in Chainpur, at 63.33%, while the lowest was Sandesh at 46.2%. These figures are provisional and may change as more electoral officers submit their reports.

What is voter turnout?

Suppose a house has 4 people – 2 adults and 2 children under the age of 18. Only the 2 adults in this house can vote. This means that there are 2 eligible voters.

Now, let’s suppose that only one of them goes to the polling booth to vote. Out of 2 people who should have voted, only one turned up to vote. The turnout, in this case is ½ = 50%.

Likewise, in a village, we have 100 eligible voters, and 60 of them turn up to vote, then the voter turnout is 60%. In short, voter turnout is the percentage of eligible people who turn up to vote.