For Bhavik Vasava, a resident of Khuta Amba village located 15 kilometres from Rajpipla of Narmada district, making a phone call is literally an uphill task — he has to hike 1.5 kilometres to the nearest hillock to connect to the available 3G network. "The network coverage on the hillock does not allow data browsing. So, for any online work, we have to travel up to Rajpipla," says Vasava, a student who looks to cast his first vote ever in the upcoming Lok Sabha elections. The nearly 700-odd residents of Khuta Amba own mobile phones and other gadgets. They own motorcycles, too. But lack of network coverage has meant that phone calls can be made only until sunset as wild animals lurk in the dark. "So, no one attempts to walk that stretch. Even calling the 108 ambulance is impossible at night," he says. Khuta Amba village is part of the Chhota Udepur Lok Sabha seat. It falls under the Nandod Assembly constituency, which is home to the Statue of Unity. With the installation of the world's tallest statue, the area boasts of rapid pace of development. However, Khuta Amba village, which is only about a 45-minute drive away from the Sardar Patel statue, remains untouched. As Gujarat goes to polls on May 7, the village will house one of the nine shadow area polling stations in Nandod. The tribal-dominated Narmada district has 24 shadow areas in the upcoming Lok Sabha polls — a sharp decline from the 105 shadow areas it had in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. Officials attribute this to the "development" brought about by growing tourist activities in and around the Statue of Unity. "The presence of SoU in Nandod has also attracted mobile phone operators, but it is true that the direct installation of mobile towers has occurred only around SoU, which is now a lucrative location for telecommunications due to the tourist footfalls," said a Narmada district official. Khuta Amba, which is 5.20 kilometres away from the closest BSNL tower, will see a polling station being set up for the Lok Sabha polls, equipped with walkie-talkies of the forest department and other wireless equipment of the administration. Like Khuta Amba, Barkhadi, located 15.11 kilometres away from the closest BSNL tower, has no 2G, 3G, or 4G coverage. Other villages outside the network spectrum of the Nandod Assembly seat include Surpan, Zer, Chin Kuva and Dhirkhadi. The village of Thavadia, located 2.7 kilometres from the BSNL tower near the Narmada Dam now has 2G network coverage, but not enough to drop its shadow area status. In the neighbouring Dediapada Assembly constituency, which is a part of the Bharuch Lok Sabha seat, there are 15 shadow areas that are completely devoid of any mobile network, despite being located within five kilometres of Reliance Jio Infocomm Limited (RJIL) towers. These towers have been installed as part of the agreement signed by the Department of Telecommunication (DoT) to provide network coverage in the remote villages of Narmada district. Officials say the numbers of shadow areas in the district have dropped drastically from 105 in 2019 to 24 this year, mainly due to the installation of mobile towers in the region in the past five years. "In 2021, the forest lands were acquired for setting up 4G telecommunication towers and laying optical fibre cable routes under Universal Service Obligation Fund (USOF) for the district. In 2022, the 4G towers were commissioned to provide coverage to over 350 villages of Dediapada taluka as per an agreement with RJIL. Similar projects were also commissioned across other districts," the district official said. According to the State election commission, shadow areas in the state have reduced from 444 in 2019 to 257 in the upcoming Lok Sabha polls. Shadow areas in Banaskantha have reduced from 29 to 13, Panchmahal from 38 to four, Dangs from 67 to 33, Tapi from 19 to 10, and Bharuch from 16 to 7. On the other hand, Amreli, Jamnagar and Aravalli, which had 14, 13 and five shadow areas respectively in 2019, record zero this year. At the same time, some districts have also seen an increase in shadow areas, which officials attribute to an additional number of polling stations set up in the remote locations. Hence, shadow areas in Sabarkantha have increased to 26 from 22 in 2019, while Valsad has 41 this year as against 17 during last general elections. Chhota Udepur has also seen a minor rise in shadow areas from 37 in 2019 to 41 this year. Gujarat Chief Electoral Officer P Bharathi says, "In some areas, the number of booths may have also increased. The major contributing factor to this has been development and also the emphasis laid by the Election Commission of India by appointing telecommunications nodal officers who have worked to provide coverage in many remote areas. While the areas may not have mobile network coverage, all polling stations will be equipped with wireless devices for communication during the polls”. However, Bhavik Vasava says, "If we have network coverage in the village, it will benefit all of us immensely. We hope that mobile towers will be set up here”.
