UKPSC Prelims 2024 General Studies Paper-I · Question 88 of 147

Correct — C, Arunachal Pradesh.

Malogam is a hamlet in Anjaw district, in the far east of Arunachal Pradesh, about 39 km from Hayuliang. It lies in Hayuliang assembly constituency, which forms part of the Arunachal East Lok Sabha seat.

Its electoral roll carries one name, Sokela Tayang, so the Election Commission set up a polling station for a single elector. Arunachal Pradesh polled in one phase on 19 April 2024, and the booth reached 100 per cent turnout the moment she voted.

The idea to carry away: the Commission takes the booth to the voter, not the voter to the booth. Its norm is that a polling station should ordinarily lie within 2 km of every elector's home, which is why a one-voter station exists at all.

• (a)
  Himachal Pradesh — Himachal Pradesh is the answer to a different polling-station question: Tashigang in Lahaul and Spiti is the world's highest polling station, at about 15,256 feet.

  Its four Lok Sabha seats voted in the seventh and last phase, on 1 June 2024, whereas Malogam voted on 19 April.

• (b)
  Assam — Assam is Arunachal Pradesh's larger neighbour in the Brahmaputra valley, and the northeastern state whose 14 Lok Sabha seats were spread across three phases in 2024: 19 April, 26 April and 7 May.

  Malogam lies across the state line, up in the hills of Anjaw, which is an Arunachal district.

• (d)
  Mizoram — Mizoram's single Lok Sabha seat did poll on 19 April 2024, the same day as Arunachal Pradesh, so the polling date cannot separate the two.

  Mizoram is the northeastern state that held its assembly election separately, in November 2023, whereas Arunachal Pradesh voted for its assembly and the Lok Sabha together in April 2024.

A polling station is the physical place where the electors of a defined part of a constituency cast their votes. Under Section 25 of the Representation of the People Act, 1951, the District Election Officer provides them, with the Election Commission's prior approval, before each election.

The guiding principle is access rather than headcount. The Commission's norm is that an elector should ordinarily not have to travel more than about 2 km to vote, and difficult terrain justifies a station for very few voters. Because the unit is the voter's locality, a station can legitimately serve a single elector.

• Malogam is in Anjaw district, eastern Arunachal Pradesh, about 39 km from Hayuliang; the district headquarters is Hawai.
• The polling station falls under Hayuliang assembly constituency and the Arunachal East Lok Sabha constituency.
• The sole elector is Sokela Tayang; her vote on 19 April 2024 gave the booth 100 per cent turnout.
• Malogam had a single elector on its roll — the smallest roll reported in the state's 2024 poll.
• Arunachal Pradesh voted for its two Lok Sabha seats and its 60-member assembly together, in a single phase, on 19 April 2024.
• Malogam was already a one-voter polling station at the 2019 Lok Sabha election, when Arunachal Pradesh polled on 11 April 2019.
• Section 25 of the Representation of the People Act, 1951 makes the District Election Officer provide polling stations, with the Election Commission's prior approval.
• The Commission's norm is that a polling station should ordinarily lie within 2 km of every elector's residence.
• Tashigang in Lahaul and Spiti, Himachal Pradesh, at about 15,256 feet, is the world's highest polling station; it voted on 1 June 2024.
• Banej, inside Gujarat's Gir forest, was long India's other famous single-voter booth; its lone elector Bharatdas Darshandas died in 2019.

• Treating the polling date as the discriminator: Assam's first-phase seats and Mizoram also voted on 19 April 2024, so the date leaves three options standing; the district settles it.
• Swapping Malogam for Tashigang: both are remote-booth stories from 2024, but Tashigang's claim is altitude, in Himachal Pradesh, not a one-name roll.
• Attaching the single-voter fame to Banej in Gujarat's Gir forest: that story belongs to an earlier elector, Bharatdas Darshandas, and a different state.

No eligible match among this question's citable set.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Malogam, the single-voter polling station of the 2024 Lok Sabha election, lies in which district of Arunachal Pradesh?

  • (a)Tawang
  • (b)Anjaw
  • (c)Changlang
  • (d)Lower Subansiri
  Answerb — Malogam is a hamlet of Anjaw district, about 39 km from Hayuliang, in the state's far east; the district is administered from Hawai.

  Tawang is the westernmost district, on the Bhutan border; Changlang lies in the south-east along the Myanmar border; Lower Subansiri, with its headquarters at Ziro, is in the central-western part of the state.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  The Malogam polling station falls under which Lok Sabha constituency?

  • (a)Arunachal West
  • (b)Arunachal East
  • (c)Lakhimpur
  • (d)Dibrugarh
  Answerb — Hayuliang assembly constituency, which contains Malogam, is a segment of Arunachal East.

  Arunachal West is the state's other Lok Sabha seat, on the Itanagar side; Lakhimpur and Dibrugarh are constituencies of Assam, across the state border.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Tashigang, described as the world's highest polling station during the 2024 Lok Sabha election, is in which State or Union Territory?

  • (a)Ladakh
  • (b)Uttarakhand
  • (c)Himachal Pradesh
  • (d)Sikkim
  Answerc — Tashigang is in Lahaul and Spiti district of Himachal Pradesh, at about 15,256 feet, and voted on 1 June 2024.

  Ladakh's single seat polled on 20 May 2024; Uttarakhand's five seats and Sikkim's one seat both voted on 19 April 2024.