Gujarat which is considered a forward looking state had second most weakest voting turnout in last Lok Sabha elections. According to a release by India’s Press Information Bureau, in the general elections of 2004, Jammu and Kashmir witnessed the lowest voters turn out with 35%, yet it seemed reasonably good keeping in view the difficult situation in the State arising out of militancy but progressive and prosperous Gujarat surprised the observers with second lowest turnout of about 45%.
The National Capital Territory of Delhi had third lowest turnout of 47% voting.

Apart from Gujarat and Delhi, the other States which lagged behind in polling percentage and polled less than 50% include Rajasthan (49.97%), Uttar Pradesh (48.16%), Madhya Pradesh (48.09%) and Uttaranchal (48.07%). The Union territory of Chandigarh witnessed a polling of about 51% in 2004 general elections.

Amongst the States which accounted for heavy polling, Nagaland electors led the nation in the voters’ turn out with a poll percentage of 91.7%, West Bengal 78.04% (if we count Lakshdweep – 81% separately with its very small number of electorates),Kerala 71.45%, Andhra Pradesh 69.95%, Karnataka 65.14% and Tamil Nadu 60.81%.

Besides Nagaland, the other hilly and North-eastern States also polled impressively with Sikkim (77.95%), Assam (69.11%), Manipur (67.41%), Tripura (67.08%) and Mizoram (63.6%). While in Arunachal Pradesh the polling percentage was 56.35%, Meghalaya somewhat lagged behind amongst the NE States with a modest voters turnout of 52.69%.

In the Northern parts, Haryana took the lead with 65.72% polling, followed by Punjab (61.59%) while the neighboring Himachal Pradesh polled 59.71%. In East, Orissa (66.06%) was way ahead of Bihar which witnessed a voters turnout of 58.02%.