New Delhi:
The fate of candidates contesting on 81 Jharkhand Assembly seats, which went to polls in five phases from November 30 to December 20, will be officially decided on Monday. The counting started at 8 am in all the 24 district headquarters. The maximum rounds of counting will take place at Chatra with 28 rounds and lowest round at two seats -- Chandankyari and Torpa.
The Election Commission has made arrangements for counting at all the districts headquarters. The first result is expected around 1 pm on Monday.
Both BJP and Congress alliance made their best efforts to lure the voters.
The BJP is hoping to retain power in Jharkhand following setbacks and winning fewer seats in both the Maharashtra and Haryana Assembly election as compared to the 2014 elections in the two states. However, several of the NDA allies, including BJP's current Jharkhand alliance partner AJSU contested the 2019 Assembly polls on their own. Ram Vilas Paswan's Lok Janshakti Party (LJP) and the Nitish Kumar-led Janata Dal (United) also contested the polls alone.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi and BJP President and Union Home Minister Amit Shah addressed nine rallies each.
While former Congress President Rahul Gandhi addressed five rallies and Congress General Secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra addressed one rally.
The hot seat, which will be the centre of attraction on the counting day will be Jamshedpur East. Chief Minister Raghubar Das has been winning this seat since 1995. He is up against ex-cabinet colleague Saryu Rai. Saryu Rai turned rebellion after his ticket was put on hold by the party.
Most exit polls telecast by news channels soon after voting ended for the fifth and final phase of the Jharkhand elections on Friday indicated a hung assembly.
The ABP/C-Voters has given 35 seats to the opposition alliance of the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM), the Congress and the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD).
It has given 32 seats to the ruling BJP, five to the AJSU Party and three to the Jharkhand Vikas Morcha (Prajatantrik) and six to others.
Aaj Tak has given the BJP between 22 and 32 seats, and the JMM-led opppsition between 38 and 50 seats. It has predicted two to four seats for the JVM-P, three to five for the AJSU Party and four to seven for others.
Jharkhand/Bihar Hindi news channel, News-XI, has given the BJP between 30 and 35 seats.
It has given the JMM between 17 and 22 seats, the Congress between nine and 12, the AJSU Party between eight and 12 seats, and the JVM-P between four and six seats. Others have been given between eight and 10 seats by the channel.
In the present assembly, the BJP has 43 members, JMM 19, Congress eight, AJSU Party three, JVM(P) two, CPI(ML) Liberation one, MCC one and others two.
Two MLAs Geeta Koda (Independent) and AJSU Party's Chandra Prakash Choudhary resigned after being elected to Lok Sabha.
The five-phase election was held between November 30 and December 20.
