Haryana, Maharashtra to go to polls on Oct 21; counting on Oct 24

New Delhi, Sep 21 (IANS) Assembly elections for the 288-member Maharashtra and 90-member Haryana assembly will be held on October 21, the Election Commission said on Saturday. The results will be declared on October 24.

Announcing the schedule of the Assembly polls in both the states, Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Sunil Arora said, "The Assembly polls in Haryana and Maharashtra will be held on October 21 and the counting of votes will take place on October 24."

He said the notification for the elections will be issued on September 27. "Last date for filing nomination is October 4, while the scrutiny of the nomination papers will be done on October 5," he said.

The CEC said that the last day for withdrawing nominations is October 7.

Arora also said that the tenure of the Haryana legislative assembly will expire on November 2, while that of Maharashtra will end on November 9.

In the 2014 Assembly polls in Maharashtra, the BJP had won 122 seats, its ally Shiv Sena 63 seats, the Congress 42 seats, the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) 41 seats while others managed 20.

The Congress and the NCP had contested the 2014 Assembly polls separately after sharing power for 15 years in the state.

In the 2014 Assembly polls in Haryana, the BJP won 47 seats followed by the Indian National Lok Dal (INLD) at 19 while the ruling Congress managed just 15 seats. Two seats went to the Haryana Janhit Congress (HJC), and one each to the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) and the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP). Five Independents were also elected.