NEW DELHI: The voting for the Maharashtra and Jharkhand legislative assembly elections concluded on Wednesday amid reports of violent clashes with the lowest turnout recorded in India’s financial and entertainment Hub, Mumbai.
According to the Indian Election Commission, the voter turnout in Mumbai, the largest city of Maharashtra stood at 51.27 percent, just 1 percent higher than the 48.4 percent turnout in 2019.
The state elections in Maharashtra and Jharkhand are a test case to determine the popularity of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist party and its regional partners.
The election comes nearly four months after his party suffered a setback and returned to power in national elections for a third term without a parliamentary majority. He formed the government with the help of regional allies.
In Maharashtra, the election was conducted in a single phase for all 288 Legislative Assembly seats. However, in Jharkhand, polling was held for the remaining 38 seats, as voting for 43 constituencies took place on November 13, with a 64.86 percent voter turnout.
Voting in all 288 constituencies of Maharashtra started at 7 am and concluded at 6 pm. Maharashtra has a total of 9,64,85,765 registered voters, including 1,16,355 service voters. The Election Commission of India (ECI) set up 1,00,186 polling stations across the state.
In Jharkhand, polling started at 7 am in 14,218 polling stations and continued till 5 pm barring 31 booths which ended at 4 pm.
Maharashtra, India’s wealthiest state is currently ruled by a coalition of Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party and a Hindu nationalist ally. An opposition alliance, including the Congress party, is in power in Jharkhand state.
The Times of India had reported clashes between BJP and SP (Samajwadi Party) workers at Kanpur polling booth. Samajwadi Party MP Dimple Yadav criticised the Election Commission and the administration over the handling of the ongoing elections.
“The kind of atmosphere created by the administration raises questions because they have worked against the democracy,” Yadav said.
According to Hindustan Times Maharashtra’s political landscape has seen significant changes since the last assembly elections.
The BJP and Shiv Sena, once allies, contested against the Congress and Sharad Pawar-led NCP. However, differences over the chief minister’s role led to the BJP-Shiv Sena alliance ending, bringing about the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) coalition of the Congress, NCP, and Shiv Sena.
