The Election Commission of India (ECI) is poised to unveil the schedule for the highly anticipated Maharashtra and Jharkhand Assembly elections today at 3:30 PM. This is quite timely given that Maharashtra’s 288-seat Assembly is due to expire on November 26, thus requiring a proper electoral process to be in place. On the other hand, the 81-member Jharkhand Assembly has a term ending on January 5, 2025.
Apart from the assembly polls, the ECI is likely to announce the by-elections date, including the Wayanad Lok Sabha seat, which was left by Rahul Gandhi. The party has declared that Priyanka Gandhi Vadra will be the party’s candidate for this important seat.
The political climate in Maharashtra is getting charged with the ruling alliance, the Mahayuti, which includes the BJP, Shiv Sena, and NCP, facing the opposition alliance, Maha Vikas Aghadi, including Congress and the Uddhav Thackeray faction of Shiv Sena. In Jharkhand, the incumbent Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) that is part of the INDIA bloc will be up against the National Democratic Alliance (NDA), which includes the All Jharkhand Students Union (AJSU) and the Janata Dal (United).
In preparation for these elections, recent changes in Maharashtra are as follows: The Cabinet has recommended increasing the annual income limit for OBC non-creamy layer candidates from Rs 8 lakh to Rs 15 lakh. Also on Monday, they announced that light motor vehicles coming into Mumbai would not be charged a toll tax.
Most importantly, there were speculations that the Maharashtra assembly elections would be held simultaneously with those in Haryana and Jammu and Kashmir, but the ECI decided to go for a different calendar. The Chief Election Commissioner, Rajiv Kumar, said that this was done because of the logistic constraints but due to the additional security measures for elections in Jammu and Kashmir.
While people wait for specifics on the poll dates, today’s announcement is expected to set the political tone in both the states before the upcoming polls.
