Politechnica’s Insights on Women Voters Shaping Indian Elections

The ‘silent voter’ is one of the key factors currently in Maharashtra politics. In an unprecedented outcome, where the ruling alliance won such a landslide victory for the first time in the past four decades, the higher participation of women voters became an important reason for the victory. From the ruling parties to the Opposition parties, top leaders have acknowledged the impact of the Majhi Ladki Bahin Yojana and the increased turnout of women voters.

When compared with the 2019 Maharashtra State Legislative Assembly election, data show over 6% more women turned out to vote in the 2024 election. In 2019, 59.26% women had voted. That increased to 65.22% women in the 2024 election.

The difference between the percentage of male voters and the percentage of female voters also fell this time. In 2019, 62.77% men had voted, which was over 3.5% more than the number of women voters. But during these elections, the percentage of male voters stood at 66.84%, an increase of over four percentage points since 2019; and the percentage of female voters increased substantially to 65.22%. This brought down the difference between the men’s and women’s voting percentage to just over 1.5%.