Maharashtra Assembly polls 2024: Will Sharad Pawar’s NCP-SP get new symbol? EC says, ‘have accepted request to…’

On NCP-SP symbol, Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar said that they have agreed to all the requests by Sharad Pawar's party and tweaked the size of the symbol - a man blowing turha - so that it looks prominent on the voting machine

The CEC said, “We received two request related to the NCP-SP symbol - a man blowing turha. First, since we have already recognised them as a state party, we must also permit them to receive contributions. Second, as their symbol looks small on ballot machines, the party had requested to tweak the size of the symbol so that it looks prominent on the EVMs. Both the requests have been approved.”

His comments came while announcing the dates for of polling in the two states - Maharashtra and Jharkhand in a press conference here.

Assembly poll dates announced

Jharkhand is set to vote in two phases in assembly polls to be held on November 13 and 20 while Maharashtra will go in for a single-phase election on November 20. Votes will be counted in the two states on November 23.

A total of 2.60 crore voters are eligible to cast votes in Jharkhand and there are 1.31 crore male and 1.29 crore female voters. The state has 11.84 lakh are first-time voters and there are 66.84 lakh young voters.

The CEC said Gazette notification for the two phases in Jharkhand will be issued on October 18 and 22 respectively.

“....The last date of making nominations for the two phases is October 25 and 29, the date for scrutiny of nominations is October 28 and 30 and last date for withdrawal of candidatures is October 30 and November 1 respectively.”

The key contenders in the Maharashtra elections are the ruling Mahayuti Alliance, which includes the BJP, Shiv Sena, and NCP and the opposition Maha Vikas Aghadi coalition, comprising the Shiv Sena (UBT), NCP (Sharad Pawar faction), and Congress.

In the recent parliamentary elections to 48 seats in the state, the opposition MVA fared well. The BJP's share fell to 9 seats, down from 23 seats five years ago. MVA secured 30 seats.In the 2019 assembly election, the BJP won 105 seats and the Congress 44.