Wednesday, February 2 2005 11:04 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Chandigarh: Even 38 years after the formation of Haryana and nine Assembly elections so far, there are six constituencies in the State where no woman has ventured out to contest the polls to enter the State Assembly.

Three Assembly constituencies have broken the myth as women candidates would be contesting for the first time ever. The three constituencies where women candidates are making their maiden attempts are Nilokheri, Meham and Narnaund.

Incidentally, the State for the first time ever has a woman officer as Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) of the State to supervise the conduct of the Assembly elections. A 1975 batch IAS officer Urvashi Gulati is the present CEO.

The six Assembly constituencies in the State from where no woman candidate has ever filled her nomination papers for elections to the State Legislative Assembly since 1967 when the State went to the polls for the first time are Radaur, Guhla, Julana, Hassanpur, Nuh and Sohna.

Ruling INLD (Indian National Lok Dal) has put up Saroj from Narnaund where she faces 12 males while BJP (Bharatiya Janata party) has fielded Meena Chaudhary from Meham where she is pitted against as many as 10 candidates. The third woman Kamla (Lok Dal) is locked in an eight cornered contest from Nilokheri.

Though women account for around 46 per cent of the total electorate of 1.27 crore, which is expected to cast vote on February 3 during the election to the 90-member State Assembly, the number of women contestants is a meagre around six per cent. There are 60 women amongst 983 candidates.