Meghalaya: Women voters continue to outnumber men in draft electoral rolls

Shillong, Aug 5 (IANS) Women voters have once again outnumbered their male counterparts in Meghalaya’s draft electoral rolls, which were published on Wednesday following the completion of the Special Intensive Revision (SIR).

Meghalaya Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) B.D.R. Tiwari, explaining the details of the draft electoral lists published across all 12 districts of the state, said that as per the draft rolls, Meghalaya has a total of 21,69,243 registered voters, comprising 11,16,199 women, 10,53,039 men and five third-gender electors.

Meghalaya’s draft electoral roll has shrunk by over 1.8 lakh voters following a state-wide verification drive, with the Election Department publishing the revised rolls for all 60 Assembly constituencies under the SIR 2026. The draft roll now contains 21,69,243 electors, down from 23,49,645 before the revision.

During the enumeration phase, 1,80,402 electors (7.68 per cent of the total electorate) were identified under the Absent, Shifted, Deceased and Duplicate (ASDD) categories, the CEO said. Of these, 81,490 (3.47 per cent) were found to be deceased, 45,011 (1.92 per cent) were untraceable or absent, 42,532 (1.81 per cent) had permanently shifted, 6,701 (0.29 per cent) were already enrolled elsewhere (duplicate entries), and 4,668 (0.20 per cent) either refused to submit the Enumeration Form or fell under other categories.

Tiwari said the SIR 2026 involved an extensive house-to-house verification exercise carried out by the election machinery across the state. The exercise achieved 100 per cent distribution and digitisation of Enumeration Forms, covering all 23,49,645 electors in Meghalaya.

He noted that the publication of the draft electoral rolls marks the commencement of the statutory period of filing claims and objections, which will be from August 5, 2026 to September 4, 2026.

–IANS

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