Around 960 million voters will be eligible to vote in the upcoming general elections across 1.2 million polling stations manned by 15 million personnel, the Election Commission of India (ECI) announced on Thursday, giving details of its preparations for the world’s largest democratic exercise.

Of the 960 million eligible voters, a 5.3% increase 2019’s 912 million, 470 million are women, 489.952 million are men and 48,000 are classified as third gender, ECI said.

Around 17.3 million voters are aged between 18 and 19, 8.1 million have disabilities, and 17.5 million voters are 80 or older, ECI added. Of the 17.5 million voters above 80 years of age, about 200,000 are above the age of 100.

“Keeping [the faith of voters in us] in mind, ECI assures all voters, stakeholders and political parties that we are committed to providing a very pleasant experience in voting in 2024 and onwards, and also a level playing field during campaigning,” said chief election commissioner Rajiv Kumar.

“There is no other example world over of logistical movement of man and material of this magnitude in any other place.”

Read Here: BJP to target 50 per cent vote share in 2024 Lok Sabha polls, cluster meets to begin after Jan 15

The announcement came at the 14th National Voters’ Day to commemorate ECI’s 75th anniversary.

Minister of law and judtice Arjun Ram Meghwal credited BR Ambedkar for ensuring that women were allowed to vote in elections from the beginning. “Ambedkar flagged the issue of women’s right to vote as back as 1928,” he said.

ECI also underlined the increase in voter turnout.

“Over the years, we have covered a lot of ground. Starting from 17.32 crore voters in 1952, today we have 96 crore voters in our electoral rolls, which includes 47 crore women voters. The voting percentage has increased from 45% in the first general elections [between 1951-52] to 67% in the last general elections,” election commissioner Anup Chandra Pandey said.

“Despite all these initiatives, there are 30 crore voters who do not vote. Urban apathy, youth apathy and migrant workers are the major challenges before the commission as far as increasing the voter turnout is concerned. Targeted strategies are being carried out to address all these three segments,” Pandey added.

Both Kumar and election commissioner Arun Goel thanked political parties for cooperating with ECI, but Kumar flagged the dangers around social media use.

“At this stage, political parties being the biggest stakeholder must become the best partners in assuring the ethical journey we have to take. We must ensure that the political scenario remains elevated, and the level of political discourse is maintained. … Our aim in 2024 is to make sure that we provide a level-playing field and that elections should not only be peaceful but also have less noise, less clutter, and everyone should get equal opportunities,” Kumar said.

Read Here: What may shape the 2024 Lok Sabha elections

“In today’s world, social media plays a very critical role however both positive and negative. Any attempts to undermine the fundamental tenets of faith and trust of people in the electoral process through false narratives will be met with swift, strong and robust measures to uphold the integrity of the elections,” Kumar added.

ECI also gave out awards for best electoral practices across 13 categories. Chhattisgarh’s chief electoral officer Reena Babasaheb Kangale received the award for best performing state for election management for 2023. She said that in the 2023 assembly elections, two security personnel died in the state, a sharp decrease from the 10 casualties in 2018.

“There were fewer than ten IED blasts last year. In 2018, there were more than 25 . Violent incidents which include attacks on polling stations, vehicles and officials also drastically reduced from more than 40-50 in 2018 to about 20 in 2023. Voter turnout also increased by 2.5%. Ensuring peace during polls is necessary to ensure higher voter turnout,” Kangale said.

District electoral officer from Dantewada (Chhattisgarh), Vinit Nandanwar, won the general award for election management. Divya Prabhu, DEO of Chitradurga (Karnataka), won the general award for electoral roll management. Saju Vaheed A, DEO of South Tripura, won the award for accessible elections.

“India’s tryst with democracy is a story which needs to be told time and again, but any complacency enables authoritarian tendencies to gain ground. Today, we are at a juncture where safeguarding the independence of our institutions is paramount, so that democracy is protected and the Constitution is upheld,” Congress chief Mallikarjun Kharge said on X on the occasion ofNational Voters’ Day.

In a post on X, Union home minister Amit Shah said: “Voters’ day celebrates constitutional values and underlines the responsibility of citizens to use their voting rights to build a powerful nation. I appeal to the youth to spread awareness in this direction.”