Elections in five states to be held next month
NEW DELHI : Over 161 million people in five states across India will vote in assembly elections next month, the Election Commission of India announced on Monday, pressing the trigger on the home stretch of the 2023 poll season leading up to the general elections next summer. Mizoram, the smallest poll-bound state with 40 seats, will vote on 7 November. Elections in Chhattisgarh, which has a 90-member assembly, will be held in two phases on 7 and 17 November .
Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Telangana will go to the polls on 17, 23 and 30 November, respectively. The votes will be counted on 3 December. Chief election commissioner Rajiv Kumar said the polls in these states hold a unique significance because they will act as the final assembly elections before the general elections in 2024.
The five state elections are widely seen as a virtual semi-final for the Lok Sabha polls due by May next year and a sandbox for shaping electoral narratives, coalition arrangements and leadership decisions. Three of the five states—Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh—will also feature near-bipolar contests between the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Congress, offering an opportunity to test the strengths of the two national parties that will go head to head in nearly a third of all Lok Sabha seats. To be sure, the results of these polls are not necessarily mirrored in the general elections.
In 2018, for instance, Congress won in this poll cycle across the heartland states—Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Chattisgarh—but BJP swept 62 of the 65 Lok Sabha seats six months later. BJP national president J.P. Nadda claimed his party will form the government in all five states.
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