Maharashtra Elections 2024: When will Election Commission announce Assembly elections in state?

The tenure of the current Maharashtra Assembly ends on November 26, 2024. (PTI Photo)

Maharashtra Assembly Election 2024 News: The Election Commission of India (ECI) has set the ball rolling on Assembly elections in Maharashtra and a formal announcement of the schedule is expected in September.

The political churn witnessed in the state over the past few years, coupled with the mixed results that the Lok Sabha polls delivered, promise to make the upcoming Assembly elections a mouth-watering contest.

When will EC announce Maharashtra Election dates?

Last Thursday, the Election Commission announced that the final electoral rolls will be published on August 30. The publishing of the electoral rolls is the final official exercise, besides review of security and administrative preparedness, undertaken ahead of the notification of the election schedule.

The pre-revision activities related to updating voter list, which included house to house surveys for collection of data, making necessary changes and updating voter rolls, were carried out between June 25 and August 5. The integrated draft rolls will be published on August 6 and the period for filing claims and objections has been set from August 6 to August 20.

The disposal of claims and objections, updating data base and printing supplements will be done by August 29 and the final publication of electoral rolls will take place on August 30, the EC said in a release. The term of the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly ends on November 26.

Maharashtra Elections 2024: Two years of churn

The upheaval in Maharashtra began soon after the 2019 elections in the state as the then undivided Shiv Sena led by Uddhav Thackeray refused to form a government unless the BJP kept its promise of appointing him as the Chief Minister.

As the BJP refused to budge, resulting in a prolonged stalemate, Uddhav found support from longtime rivals Congress and NCP and eventually formed government in the state with Uddhav as CM. However, he was forced to step down in 2022 following a rebellion in his party and Eknath Shinde was appointed as the Chief Minister.

The developments in the Shiv Sena mirrored what was to follow in the NCP with Ajit Pawar breaking away from his uncle Sharad Pawar and taking a sizable chunk of the MLAs with him to the NDA. This came months after Ajit Pawar was appointed as the Deputy CM with BJP’s Devendra Fadnavis as CM in a tenure that lasted less than 72 hours.

It was only after the rebellion by Eknath Shinde in Shiv Sena that the BJP-led NDA came to power and formed a government with Shinde as the CM and Fadnavis and Pawar as his deputies.