The Election Commission today (Saturday, October 6) announced dates for the Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan, Mizoram and Telangana Assembly elections. The Model Code of Conduct came into force with the announcement.

The counting of votes of all States will be held on December 11 and results announced the same day, Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) OP Rawat said, briefing the media about the poll schedule.

Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan are under BJP rule, Mizoram has a Congress government and Telangana is under Telangana Rashtra Samiti or TRS.

The CEC began the briefing with an apology for delaying the press conference to 3 pm. He said that the commission had to take into account certain last minute considerations, including the matter of publication of electoral roll in Telangana and the decision on by-poll dates in Karnataka, which remains under the threat of poor weather condition.

The Congress had raised questions about the change of timing from morning to 3pm, alleging it was perhaps done in view of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s rally in Ajmer, Rajasthan, at 1 pm, to delay the model code of conduct coming into force. And, notably, Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje announced free electricity for farmers at a joint rally in Ajmer, Punjab Kesari reported.

Election schedule for states

The election in Chhattisgarh will be held in two phases. CEC OP Rawat said election for 18 Naxalism-hit constituencies were being held on November 12, separately, to ensure proper security arrangements. In the second phase, the election in 72 constituencies will be held on November 20.

PHASE 1

Nomination: 23rd Oct

Scrutiny: 24th Oct

Withdrawal: 26th Oct

Voting: 12th Nov

PHASE 2

Nomination: 2nd Nov

Scrutiny: 3rd Nov

Withdrawal: 5th Nov

Poll Date: 20th Nov

Legislative elections in Madhya Pradesh and Mizoram will be held on November 28.

Nomination: 9th Nov

Scrutiny: 12th Nov

Withdrawal: 14th Nov

Voting: 28th Nov

The Election Commission said that the states of Rajasthan (200 seats) and Telangana (119 seats) will go to polls together on 7 December. CEC OP Rawat said that Telangana elections were being kept on the fag end of the current phase of the polling exercise so that the poll panel could get enough to time to prepare for conducting polling.

Nomination: 19th Nov

Scrutiny: 20th Nov

Withdrawal: 22nd Nov

Voting: 7th Dec

By-polls in Shimoga, Bellary and Mandya in Karnataka to be held on November 03.

The term of Mizoram’s 50-member House expires on December 15, 2018. Chhattisgarh’s Assembly, comprising 90 members, ends on January 5, 2019. The tenure of the Madhya Pradesh 230-member House expires on January 7, 2019. The 200-member Rajasthan House expires on January 20, 2019.

Elections in Telangana were necessitated after Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao recently dissolved the House to avoid a possible clubbing of Assembly polls with the Lok Sabha elections.

Election Commissioner OP Rawat said that polling slips will also be issued in Braille because the poll panels aim remains to make election process accessible to all. He said that all-women booths will also be set up where security officials will also be women.

These assembly polls, happening less than six months before the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, are seen as a crucial indicator of voter mood and would be watched closely. According to most opinion polls, both Prime Minister Narendra Modi himself and his government have suffered a decline in their popularity, though still ahead of Congress and other rivals. But the voting in states may be on a different pattern – people may favour Modi as PM but may not be happy with the government or the chief minister in the state.

In the bigger states – Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan – and Chhattisgarh, there is a direct contest between BJP and Congress.

The BJP has been in power in Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh for the past 15 years. In both these states, it has chief ministers – Shivraj Singh Chouhan (MP) and Raman Singh (Chhattisgarh) – who enjoy a mass base. In contrast, the Congress has no leader with a pan-Chhattisgarh base. Much of its state leadership was wiped out in a naxal attack five years ago, and its former chief minister Ajit Jogi has floated his own outfit.

In MP, the Congress has a problem of plenty and is beset with factional feuds between state unit chief Kamal Nath, campaign committee chief Jyotiraditya Scindia, former chief minister Digvijaya Singh, former union ministers Suresh Pachouri and Arun Yadav and incumbent Leader of Opposition Ajay Singh. Their main concern has been to retain their dominance in the party – or what remains of it due to this feud – and try to win over the rival in the party rather than try for victory over the rival party.

In Rajasthan, a state which traditionally votes out an incumbent government every five years, the BJP is currently in power. Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje is facing a strong anti-incumbency and no longer enjoys support of either the central leadership of Modi and Shah or of her party’s state cadres. The Congress here, under state unit chief Sachin Pilot, has been making an impressive revival but his ambitions of becoming chief minister also clash with Ashok Gehlot, a former CM and arguably the most powerful national general secretary of the Congress under the Rahul Gandhi dispensation. The Congress would hope, and pray, that Gehlot and Pilot don’t work at cross purposes and jeopardize the best chance of a victory that the Congress has in this round of elections. There are hopes that Gehlot would go for a role at the all-India level and leave the reins of the state unit to Pilot.

In Telangana, the Congress is eyeing an alliance with Left parties, YSR Congress and Chandrababu Naidu’s Telugu Desam Party while the BJP is hoping for either an alliance or a “calculated understanding” with Chandrasekhar Rao’s Telangana Rashtra Samiti. The TRS leader K Chandrasekhar Rao has said his party’s principles are opposed to BJP’s politics, but has also backed NDA at the centre.

In Mizoram, the only Congress-ruled state going to polls in this round, the BJP is hoping to stitch together an alliance with regional outfits to oust chief minister Lal Thanhawla and effectively wipe out Congress rule from the north east region.