Maharashtra will vote on November 20, while results will be announced on November 23. Whereas, the polling will take place in Jharkhand in two phases on November 13 and 20. The result will be declared on November 23, along with the Maharashtra polls.
The Election Commission of India (ECI) announced the Maharashtra and Jharkhand Assembly election dates on Tuesday.
Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar says, “1,86,00 polling stations will be set up in Maharashtra, while over 29,000 polling stations will be set up in Jharkhand. Around 9.6 crore people are eligible to cast their vote in Maharashtra, while 2.6 crore will go to vote in Jharkhand.
The term of the 288-seat Maharashtra Assembly will end on November 26 while The term of the Jharkhand Assembly, with 81 seats, will end on January 5, 2025.In the 2019 assembly election, the BJP won 105 seats, while the Congress secured 44. The BJP’s performance in the recent Lok Sabha elections saw a drop, winning only nine seats out of 48, compared to 23 in the previous term, while the Maha Vikas Aghadi won 30 seats.
While the BJP hopes to make a return to power in Maharashtra, where it has an alliance with Eknath Shinde’s Shiv Sena, the saffron party will look to make a dent in Jharkhand, too. Following a successful return to power in Haryana, the BJP will be eyeing a similar run in Maharashtra, too, where the Opposition MVA has looked upbeat since winning 30 of the 48 Lok Sabha seats four months ago.
Sources have said that the BJP will contest in 105 seats, the Shiv Sena in 40, and the Nationalist Congress Party in 41. This leaves 102 of the 288 total seats still undecided. The term of the 288-seat Maharashtra Assembly will end on November 26, which means the poll process has to be completed before that.
In Jharkhand, the ruling Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM), which is a part of the INDIA bloc, will be going up against the National Democratic Alliance (NDA), which includes the All Jharkhand Students Union (AJSU) and Janata Dal (United) apart from the BJP in the state.
