GANDHINAGAR: Will the two tiny constituencies of Dadra and Nagar Haveli and Daman and Diu see any woman contestant this Lok Sabha polls? The two union territories neighbouring Gujarat are two Lok Sabha constituencies.
During the Lok Sabha polls in 2004 and 2009, only one woman out of total 25 candidates had contested from these two constituencies. This woman candidate had contested the 2004 polls unsuccessfully from Dadra and Nagar Haveli.
In 2009, no woman candidate fought for any of these two seats.
According to the
Election Commission of India (ECI), both of these are among the top five smallest Lok Sabha constituencies in the country. While Daman and Diu (DD) with an electorate of 1,02,260 is the second smallest constituency after Lakshadweep, Dadra and Nagar Haveli (DNH) is the fourth smallest constituency with an electorate of 1,88,783.
In terms of gender breakup, Daman and Diu has 52,574 female voters and their number is more than that of the male voters who are 49,386 in number. In case of Dadra and Nagar Haveli, there are 87,521 female voters while the number of male voters is 1,01,262.
An interesting aspect of the last two polls in these union territories was that a good number of political parties had fielded their candidates. Even the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) and Samajwadi Party (SP) had fielded candidates. Sources say these two parties had tried to woo the large number of migrant labourers from Uttar Pradesh employed in the industrial belts of Daman and Silvassa.
While Natu Patel of the BJP had won from Dadra and Nagar Haveli, his party candidate Lalu Patel had won from and Daman and Diu in 2009.
For 2014, more than 40% of the voters in these two constituencies are in the age group of 25-40 years.
Generally, elections in both these former Portuguese colonies are fought on issues of bringing in more environment-friendly industry and improving tourism infrastructure.