Women Lead High Voter Turnout in Himachal Panchayat Polls

By: Women Entrepreneurs Review Team | Wednesday, 27 May 2026

The first phase of panchayati raj poll was completed without any major incident Tuesday with a nearly 78% voter turnout in all the polling booths, barring some minor skirmishes in the Haroli polling booth in Una and Sheetalpur in Solan districts.

Over 14.25 lakh voters cast their votes out of the total eligible voters of 18.22 lakh. Kangra, which has the maximum number of voters among all the districts, got 75% voter turnout while Hamirpur got almost 73% voter turnout.

In terms of participation, female voters far outnumbered male voters, with 81.85% of female voters participating in the elections, while 75.51% of males participated in the elections.

Voter turnout in male population was 80.51% in Shimla district as compared to 79.37% for the female population. Likewise, in Kinnaur 73.95% men and 73.22% women voters had cast their votes, and in Sirmaur, 82.60% men and 82.54% women voters had cast their votes.

The grassroots level Kunair-Dhamaun gram panchayat of Sirmaur district achieved an impressive 97% turnout.

In Kangra district, a special auxiliary polling station was set up for the remote Bhangal gram panchayat where all 101 registered voters could vote. Polling for the Chowkidar of the ward in Ward No. 3 Deela, Chambi gram panchayat in the Chamba district was canceled after the death of one of the candidates running for the office.

Key Highlights:

• Himachal panchayat polls recorded a high 78% voter turnout
• Women voters led participation with over 81% turnout
• Minor polling irregularities caused re-polling in some areas

Likewise, in Shimla district, polling was hampered in Ward No.1, Brandli-1 in the Narain gram panchayat under Rampur block when the officials used a NOTA stamp with the authorised Swastika symbol stamp. New elections will now be run in polling stations in the ward on May 30th.

In the meanwhile, Congress and BJP feign political jibes on the results of the polls.

Congress-backed candidates are picking up large numbers in the panchayat elections and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is panicking over it, says Naresh Chauhan, principal media advisor to the chief minister, Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu.

“The BJP leaders had not expected Congress-supported candidates to receive such overwhelming public support in the panchayat elections. The people of the state are expressing confidence in the policies and decisions of the Sukhu government,” Chauhan said at a press conference in Shimla.

Former chief minister and leader of opposition, Jai Ram Thakur, thanked the voters for supporting the BJP-backed candidates. “The elections will deliver a clear mandate against the anti-people policies of the Congress government. Despite the elections proceeding peacefully across the state, a select few officials failed to uphold an impartial role during the polling. Complaints regarding negligence and irregularities in the electoral process have been received from several regions, thereby exposing the governmental impediments standing in the way of a clean and transparent democratic election process,” he said.

Polling in Mandi district got cancelled as the name of a candidate who had contested for a block development committee (BDC) was missing in the ballot papers. There are around 2,500 voters in the Thach-Thermi, Pralog and Mendi BDC ward of Karsog subdivision in Mandi district and the name of the candidate, Hoshiyar Singh, was replaced by NOTA. The mistake was uncovered shortly after polling started at 7 am.

Voting was suspended as soon as it was called. Officials intervened and the polling for the remaining five panchayati raj seats began.

After the incident, Karsog sub-divisional magistrate (SDM) Gaurav Mahajan rushed to the scene and submitted a report to the deputy commissioner and district election officer (DPM) in Mandi, Apoorv Devgan. The matter was later reported to the state election commission (SEC), which decided to postpone the election of BDC in the concerned ward.

“An inquiry will be initiated to determine how this lapse occurred, and strict action will be taken against the officials and employees found responsible,” the DC said. The SEC has rescheduled the polling for May 28.