Assembly Elections 2024: Maharashtra To Vote On Nov 20, Jharkhand In Two Phases

The Maharashtra assembly election will be held in a single phase on Nov. 20, 2024, while that in Jharkhand will be conducted in two phases on Nov. 13 and Nov. 20, the Election Commission of India announced on Tuesday. The results will be announced on Nov. 23.

The poll body had earlier bucked the practice of holding Maharashtra and Haryana elections together, citing monsoon and festive season in October.

The Nov. 20 election will come weeks after the polls in Haryana and Jammu and Kashmir, and within six months of the Lok Sabha round.

After the setback in the parliamentary elections, where it failed to win a simple majority on its own, the Bharatiya Janata Party unexpectedly bounced back in Haryana securing a third term.

The party also did well in the Jammu region, even as the opposition INDIA bloc of Congress and National Conference managed enough wins to form a government.

The 288-member legislative assembly in Maharashtra is set to complete its term on Nov. 26. The previous assembly election in Maharashtra was held in October 2019. There 29 reserved seats for Scheduled Castes and 25 for Scheduled Tribes.

The BJP-led National Democratic Alliance achieved a majority in 2019 to form the government in Maharashtra. Due to internal conflict, Shivsena left the alliance to form a new coalition with the Nationalist Congress Party and Indian National Congress to form the Maha Vikas Aghadi government, with party boss leader Uddhav Thackeray as chief minister.

In June 2022, the Thackeray government collapsed after defections and the NDA returned to power with Eknath Shinde as the CM.

This time, the MVA, comprising Shivsena (UBT), NCP (Sharad Pawar), and Congress, is preparing to challenge the ruling NDA alliance. The Mahayuti alliance consists of the BJP, Shivsena (Eknath Shinde faction), and NCP (Ajit Pawar faction).

For Jharkhand, the current term ends on Jan. 5 next year. Elections there were last held in December 2019. The assembly has 81 seats, including 28 reserved for STs and nine for SCs.

The Soren family-led Jharkhand Mukti Morcha won the 2019 assembly polls, defeating the BJP. Chief Minister Hemant Soren, who was arrested in an alleged corruption case last year and got bail in July, is aiming to secure a second term in an alliance with the Congress.