Maharashtra-Haryana polls on 21st May, 24th results in one phase

(PTI) New Delhi, Ta. September 21, 2019, Saturday

Maharashtra and Haryana will hold assembly elections on October 21 at the same stage and the BJP will face opposition from the Congress leadership to retain power in both the states. The Election Commission on Saturday announced the dates of assembly elections in Maharashtra and Haryana.

In addition, the Election Commission also announced by-elections in a total of 67 assembly seats and one Lok Sabha seat in various states of the country, including four from Gujarat. However, there are many speculations over the fact that three seats have not been declared in Gujarat yet.

Chief Election Commissioner Sunil Arora said that the two states will have voting on October 21 while counting will be held on October 24. The Maharashtra Legislative Assembly with 288 members expires on November 9 while the 90-member Haryana assembly term ends on November 2. For the first time in the country, two state assembly elections are being held in the country after the BJP came back to power under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

The important themes of the BJP in the Assembly elections of the two states include the decision of the Government to remove the provision of Article 370, which gives special status to Jammu and Kashmir. While BJP leaders are confident of returning to power in both states, their election campaign has weakened as several key opposition leaders have joined the saffron party in recent weeks.

In Maharashtra, the alliance between the BJP and the Shiv Sena is almost decided, but the sharing of seats has not been finalized. Negotiations are ongoing between the two parties in this regard. The BJP wants to contest a large share of the 288 seats, while the Shiv Sena wants to stick to the previous formula of similar assembly seats. Both sides did not agree on the issue of sharing of seats even during the 2014 assembly elections and decided to contest different elections.

At that time, the BJP won 122 seats while the Shiv Sena won 63 seats. He joined hands after the election. Asked about the announcement of the Jharkhand assembly election on Saturday when discussions were being held to hold simultaneous elections in the country, Chief Election Commissioner Arora said that the term of the assembly in Jharkhand ends on January 9.

It is a different matter if Jharkhand leaders want to boycott the assembly and hold early elections. But why should the Election Commission be held sooner, he said. Arora added that the Election Commission would create 95,473 polling stations in Maharashtra for 8.95 crore voters while in Haryana there would be 19,425 polling stations for 1.83 crore voters.