As Lok Sabha Polls Dates To Be Announced By EC On Saturday, This Is How 2019 Schedule Looked Like

The Lok Sabha elections in 2019 were held in eight phases starting on April 11, 2019. The voting continued till August 5, 2019.

With the Election Commission of India declaring that it will announce the Lok Sabha Election 2024 dates on Saturday, the poll battlefield for the world's largest democratic exercise has been thrown open. While the BJP, led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, is confident of securing a third term in office, the I.N.D.I.A bloc composed of major Opposition parties is hoping to wrest power from the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance.

Ahead of announcing the schedule for the elections, the poll panel published the electoral rolls in all the states and Union Territories with January 1, 2024 set as the qualifying date. The ECI also completed the revision of electoral rolls in Jammu & Kashmir and Assam, following the delimitation exercise. 

Marking this year's election as the largest electorate in history, a whopping 96.88 crore people have been registered as eligible voters in the upcoming polls as against 91.1 crore during the 2019 Lok Sabha polls. The 2024 electoral rolls also witnessed a surge in the gender ratio from 940 in 2023 to 948 in 2024, as per the ECI. Of the total 2.63 crore new electors added to the voters' list, around 1.41 crore are women, surpassing newly enrolled male voters by over 15 per cent. 

Lok Sabha Elections 2019: In Numbers

The total number of constituencies in the last elections held to the Lok Sabha, or the Lower House of the Parliament were 543 with 412 general seats, 84 for candidates from Scheduled Castes, and 47 reserved for the Scheduled Tribes. 

The total number of candidates in the fray during the 2019 Lok Sabha polls was 8,054 with 15 candidates on an average per constituency.  

A total of 91,19,50,734 voters were eligible to cast their votes, out of which 61,18,76,971 exercised their right to franchise settling the voting percentage at 67.1 per cent, excluding the postal ballot.

Lok Sabha Elections 2019: Schedule 

The elections to the 17th Lok Sabha were held in eight phases starting on April 11, 2019, and the last being held on August 5, 2019. 

In the first phase held on April 11, 2019, voting was conducted for 91 constituencies across 20 states and Union Territories. 

The polling for the second phase was held on April 18, 2019, for 95 seats across 12 states and Union Territories. 

The third phase on April 23, 2019, saw voting on 117 seats across 15 states and Union Territories. 

For the fourth phase, voters cast their ballots on April 29, 2019, for 71 seats across eight states and Union Territories. 

The fifth and sixth phases on May 6 and 12 were held for 50 and 59 seats, respectively, across seven states and Union Territories each. 

In the seventh phase on May 19, 2019, as many as 59 constituencies were covered across 8 states and Union Territories

The eighth phase was held on August 5, 2019, for one Lok Sabha constituency. 

Polls in West Bengal, Uttar Pradesh, and Bihar were held in seven phases while Jammu & Kashmir, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, and Odisha saw four phases. 

Assam and Chhattisgarh had polls in two phases while it was held in two phases each in Karnataka, Manipur, Rajasthan, and Tripura. 

All the remaining states and Union Territories concluded the polls in a single phase.