EC team to visit Maharashtra on Tuesday to check poll preparedness

PUNE: Election Commission officers will be on a two-day visit to Mumbai starting Tuesday to interact with various stakeholders in the upcoming Maharashtra assembly elections as part of its review of the state’s poll preparedness.
Chief Election Commissioner Sunil Arora will reach Mumbai on Tuesday evening with Election Commissioners Ashok Lavasa and Sushil Chandra and hold meetings with the election officers as well as with the civil administration and police officials besides various parties’ leaders to take stock of the state’s poll readiness due next month."This is the usual practice done ahead of the polls," an official said.
It is also being interpreted by political leaders that the poll dates are likely to be announced after these meetings are over.
The meetings would be spread over two days between Tuesday and Wednesday. The poll panel will be back to Delhi on Wednesday evening. The term of the 288-member Maharashtra assembly ends on November 9 and a new assembly has to be constituted before that.
The Commission can announce assembly elections in Maharashtra and Haryana together in the next few days. Top sources from election commission said that the announcement of dates should happen this week as they would need 35 days to complete the election process which would include counting of votes which they want to do before Diwali.
They will meet officials from the state poll unit, police, nodal officials from various central departments as well as collectors and commissioners, income tax and excise department to take stock of the preparation. The panel is also expected to assess the requirement of the additional force from the centre during the polls.
During last 2014 assembly elections, the polling dates were announced on September 12 and the gazette notification was issued on September 20 while the assembly election was held on October 15 in a single phase and the results were announced on October 19. The term of the current 13th Legislative Assembly will come to an end on November 9, 2019 as the first meeting of the new house was held on November 10, 2014.
The Congress and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) had contested the assembly polls in 2014 separately after sharing power for 15 years in the state. The two parties had parted ways following disagreements over seat-sharing. The Congress bagged 42 seats, while the NCP got 41. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) emerged as the single largest party with 122 seats and the Shiv Sena, which also fought separately, secured 63.
Elections in Maharashtra will be held along with Haryana and Jharkhand in October-November this year.