Mizoram elections: Why ‘Dingdi’ polling booths are making headlines

Aizawl, Nov 28: The Indian democracy has shown its women-friendly face off late as the election organisers started setting up pink polling booths for women during the Assembly polls last year. To facilitate women's participation in the festival of democracy, states like Goa and Punjab came up with pink polling booths that also had women staff members in them.

The ongoing Assembly elections, too, have maintained the trend and Mizoram is one of the leaders. The northeastern state which went to polls on Wednesday, November 28, along with Madhya Pradesh, has 40 constituencies and each of those is featuring a pink polling booth, locally called 'Dingdi' after a wild flower seen in the state.

The Dingdi polling booths are manned only by women officials - including one presiding officer and three polling officials and a security officer.

Mizoram is a state where women outnumber men. The ratio is 1,051 women per 1,000 men among the voters in 2018, which is more than the figures in 2013 and 2014.The number of women voters in Mizoram this year is 3.94 lakh as compared to 3.75 lakh male voters.

Mizoram has 209 candidates in fray for this year's election. The Congress is in power in the state since 2003 and it is the among the last few states that are ruled by the Grand Old Party in India at the moment.