Feels like circus, everyone joker: Why some phase 2 voters in Bengal may pick NOTA or ‘least bad’ option
Telegraph | 27 April 2026
In Bengal’s polling booths, participation remains high, but belief is thinning, as many voters said they go for NOTA (none of the above) option in the EVM as they are politically exhausted, unrepresented, and forced to choose between rejection and compromise.
What connects them is not apathy, but distance: from parties, from leaders, and from the idea that electoral politics reflects their concerns.
Gourav Paul, 25, from Maheshtala in South 24 Parganas, has never voted for a candidate.
“I vote every time, but I press NOTA. I don’t trust any of them,” he said. “The day I find someone I genuinely believe in, I’ll vote for that person. Party doesn’t matter. For me, it’s always about the issues. Whoever speaks about them seriously becomes my candidate.”
His disillusionment is not recent. “I’ve felt this way since my teenage years, when I started understanding politics better. Nothing meaningful is happening in West Bengal. It all feels like a circus, and everyone looks like a joker,” he said. “Whether I vote or not hasn’t changed anything, because no one is working on the real issues.”
For Paul, campaign promises often reinforce that disconnect rather than bridge it.
“If one party promises Rs 1,500 and another promises Rs 3,000, that doesn’t make either of them better. That’s not governance,” he said. “It comes from disappointment. The kind of leader I can trust is someone who understands core problems — someone who will fix the education system and take real steps to protect the environment.”
“I’m politically tired,” he adds. “People around us are hooked on clickbait, and political parties are playing along. It’s become a game.”
In the 2021 Bengal Assembly elections, 6, 46,827 votes, or about 1.08 per cent of the total 5.99 crore votes polled, went to NOTA. In Maheshtala, 2,049 voters chose that option.
In the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, several constituencies across Bengal recorded NOTA votes in the range of 15,000 to 24,000, pointing to a persistent, if diffuse, strand of electoral disengagement.
In Howrah Madhya, Shatadru Mukhopadhyay, 29, still votes, but without alignment.
“I don’t align with any party’s ideology, but I still vote. It’s a basic right, and I don’t want to give that up,” he says. “There was one time I voted for someone I didn’t believe in. I was driven by certain political ideas back then — ideas that don’t make much sense to me now.”
For him, the shift has been gradual but decisive. “Earlier, I used to follow candidates in my constituency quite closely. But this feeling that no party represents me is new. It really started after the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. Before that, I was a strong supporter of one particular party.”
Now, voting feels stripped of conviction. “When I vote, issues matter more than anything else. But choosing one candidate over another doesn’t feel meaningful anymore. It feels like an empty choice,” he said. “When I say I don’t connect with any party, especially to friends who are very politically driven, they see it as illogical.”
In the 2021 Assembly elections, Howrah Madhya recorded 2,735 NOTA votes.
In Behala Paschim, Soumya Ukil, 29, approaches voting less as an expression of belief and more as an exercise in risk management.
“Even if no party truly represents me, whoever is in power will make decisions that affect my life and everyone around me,” he said. “So I’ve had to let go of the idea of an ‘ideal’ choice. What I’m left with is choosing the option that does the least harm.”
That choice, he argued, is often shaped by constraint rather than preference.
Asked whether voting makes a tangible difference, Ukil is uncertain. “It creates the feeling that we’re participating…I feel politically ignored by the Left, politically used by liberals, and overall, just politically tired.”
In 2021, Behala Paschim recorded 2,433 NOTA votes.
Ritam Sarkar, 25, from Behala Purba, framed the disconnect in more structural terms.
“Every party is guided by an ideology — capitalism, socialism, or something in between. But in a country as diverse as India, where people differ in language, culture, religion and history, it’s unrealistic to expect everyone to align with a single ideology,” he said. “That’s where the disconnect begins — when parties try to impose that uniformity.”
Even so, he does not reject the process entirely. “A country needs leadership to function. I still believe in voting,” he said.
But the gap between expectation and experience remains wide. “There’s a lack of industry, a lack of jobs, and unemployment just keeps rising,” he says. “I often choose the ‘least bad’ option. It feels less like a choice and more like a consolation.”
In Behala Purba, 2,835 voters chose NOTA in 2021.
For Ritupriya Debnath, 28, from Tollygunge, voting is driven by caution rather than conviction.
“If I don’t vote, someone else might misuse that vote,” she says. “So I usually end up voting for the least bad option.”
Her concerns are rooted in everyday pressures — education, employment, and opportunity. “Money needs to be spent where it actually matters — on work that benefits both people and the environment,” she said.
She points to a system where rising costs are not matched by expanding opportunities. “Fees keep increasing, but the number of final selections doesn’t match the number of applicants. That gap is hard to ignore,” she says. “Fewer opportunities and more competition push people out of the system. Long-term stability is disappearing.”
Tollygunge recorded 2,310 NOTA votes in 2021.
They continue to stand in queues, press buttons, and take part in the ritual of democracy. But the meaning of that participation for many, it is simply a compromise between limited options.