Ajit's death casts shadow on ZP, panchayat samiti polls; voting moved to Feb 7, counting on Feb 9

Voting for 12 zilla parishads and 125 panchayat samitis in Maharashtra will now take place on February 7, instead of February 5 as announced earlier, the state poll panel said on Thursday citing three-day mourning declared in the wake of Deputy CM Ajit Pawars death.

Voting for 12 zilla parishads and 125 panchayat samitis in Maharashtra will now take place on February 7, instead of February 5 as announced earlier, the state poll panel said on Thursday citing three-day mourning declared in the wake of Deputy CM Ajit Pawar's death. According to the revised programme, the counting of votes will take place on February 9, instead of February 7 as decided earlier, said the State Election Commission (SEC). The polls have been rescheduled in view of the three-day mourning (January 28-30) declared in the state after the passing away of Pawar in an air crash on January 28 at Baramati in Pune district, the SEC said in a statement. The election schedule for 12 zilla parishads (ZPs) and 125 panchayat samitis was announced on January 13 and the process of filing nominations, withdrawal, symbol allotment and publication of the final list of candidates have already been completed, it said. The Supreme Court had granted a two-week extension beyond January 31 to complete the polls. However, the state government declared three-day mourning following Pawar's death, prompting changes in the remaining election stages, the commission said. District collectors will issue revised notifications on January 31. Campaigning for the polls will end at 10 pm on February 5 and polling will be held two days later between 7.30 am and 5.30 pm. The counting of votes will begin at 10 am on February 9, after which the model code of conduct will be withdrawn. The names of elected members will be published in a government gazette by February 11, the commission added. As many as 731 seats in 12 zilla parishads and 1,462 in 125 panchayat samitis are up for grabs in the polls. A total of 2,624 candidates are in the fray for ZP polls, while 4,814 nominees are contesting in panchayat samiti elections. Zilla parishads and panchayat samitis are part of rural local self-government system. Elections to 29 municipal corporations, including Mumbai, took place on January 15 and results were announced the next day. Polls to municipal councils and nagar panchayats in Maharashtra were held in December.

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