The Congress will face BJP in both states...
On Tuesday, 15 October 2024, the Election Commission will announce the dates for Assembly polls in Maharashtra and Jharkhand.
The EC will announce the poll schedule at a press conference at 3.30 pm.
In Maharashtra's Assembly elections in 2019, the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA), comprising a unified Shiv Sena and Nationalist Congress Party, with the Congress, won 154 of 288 seats.
This year's election will probably be the last prestige battle of 2024 with the fractured Shiv Sena and NCP battling the BJP-led Mahayuti alliance.
Sources said the party will contest 158 of the state's 288 seats. It has offered 70 seats to Eknath Shinde's Shiv Sena and 50 to Ajit Pawar's Nationalist Congress Party.
The Congress battered by the Haryana defeat, will face an upbeat BJP. Among the key figures to be watched in the poll season in Maharashtra will be Maratha quota activist Manoj Jarange Patil, who has held a series of hunger strikes to demand reservation for the community.
In the Lok Sabha election held, MVA won 30 of the state's 48 Lok Sabha seats. The ruling alliance won 17. One seat went to an Independent candidate.
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