97 crore voters: CEC Gyanesh Kumar calls India biggest family in world
Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar called India's 97 crore voters the "biggest family in the world" and highlighted the scale of the Election Commission's election machinery. Speaking in Lucknow, he said 1.8 crore people work with the ECI during Lok Sabha polls and are connected through ECINET, which also stores election data since 1951.
Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar said on Monday that India, with around 97 crore voters, is "the biggest family in the world". He used the figure to underline the scale of the country’s democracy and the size of the election machinery involved in conducting Lok Sabha polls.
Speaking at the regional conference of ELC 2.0 and ECINET in Lucknow, Kumar also highlighted ECINET as the platform that connects election officials across levels. He said the app, launched 4-5 months ago, is expected to become the largest app in India by the end of this year.
According to a statement from the office of the Uttar Pradesh chief electoral officer, Kumar said, "In India, there are approximately 97 crore voters. This figure is not just a statistic; it's significant. Do you know what 97 crore equals in terms of voter population of various countries? If you add the voters of the US, Canada, South America, entire Europe, entire Africa, entire South-East Asia, even then 8 crore is left. You are a part of such a large democracy. This is the biggest family in the world."
He also spoke about the scale of the Election Commission of India’s work during Lok Sabha elections. "The Government of India, the world's largest government, employs 65 lakh people. In contrast, Walmart, the largest private company, employs 20 lakh. During Lok Sabha elections, the ECI becomes the largest organisation on Earth, with 1.8 crore people working alongside it," he said.
Kumar said there could be no better example of transparency than this. Asking how communication happens with these 1.8 crore people, he said all of them are connected through ECINET, which links state chief electoral officers, district election officers, sub-divisional magistrates, booth-level officers, presiding officers and counting officers.
He added that there are 2.5 crore downloads of Twitter, now known as X, in India and said, "the truth is on ECINET". Kumar said the app carries information from all elections since 1951, including polling booth-wise voter turnout, votes secured by candidates and their affidavits. In his remarks, he presented both the size of India’s voter base and the role of ECINET in connecting the election system and storing election data.