Telangana election dates: Polling on November 30, result on December 3. Here is all you should know

Ahead of the big fight in 2024 Lok Sabha polls, five key states -- Telangana, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh, Telangana, Mizoram -- are going for polls this year. Election Commission of India (ECI) today announced that polling in Telangana will happen on November 30 and the result will be declared on December 3. The term of the 119-seat Telangana assembly is coming to end in January second week.

What happened in 2018 Telangana elections:
In 2018, KCR returned for a second term as chief minister. The BRS got 87 seats in the 119-member House and 47% of the vote in the state. Twenty-two seats were won by the Prajakutami (People's Alliance), which was made up of the Congress, the Telugu Desam Party (TDP), the Telangana Jana Samithi, and the CPI. They won seven seats, with the BJP getting one and the Independents getting two.

Despite big win in the Telangana Assembly election in 2018, the BJP secured surprising four seats and the Congress three. The Telangana Rashtra Samithi won nine, with its ally All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen taking one seat.


Important dates:
Date of notification: November 3
Last date of nominations: November 10, 2023
Date for scrutiny of nominations: November 13, 2023
Last date for withdrawal of candidatures: November 15, 2023

Election Name	Telangana assembly election 2023
Authority	Election Commission of India
Term ending on	January 16, 2024
Total seats	119
Current government	BRS
Current chief minister of Telangana	KC Rao
Major parties	Indian National Congress, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Bharat Rashtra Samiti (BRS)
Telangana elections date 2023	November 3, 2023
Majority seats	60

Triangular contest in Telangana between BRS, BJP & Congress
In the upcoming polls, there will be a three-way race between the BJP, the Bharat Rashtra Samithi, which is currently in power, and the Congress. BRS took 88 of the 119 seats in the 2018 Assembly elections and got 47.4 per cent of the vote. Congress, on the other hand, came in second place with only 19 seats and 28.7% of the vote.

Why Telangana polls are important for BRS, BJP and Congress:
The polls are important for both BJP and Congress as it will be the first set of elections after the formation of opposition's grand alliance against the BJP before the next year's Lok Sabha elections.

Will K Chandrashekhar Rao win the state again?
For the Congress, the polls are very important because, the big old party would need to keep the two states to stay in power as the main opposition even though opposition groups are changing their roles more and more. The Congress is an important part of the anti-BJP INDIA bloc, but how strong it is in the alliance will rest on how many seats it wins in the upcoming state elections.

There is a lot at stake for KCR. The BRS has been in power since 2014, when Telangana became a state. As a natural phenomena, the party is facing anti-incumbency due to ten-year rule. The party has 101 MLAs out of 119 in the state Assembly.

KCR has announced a slew of big populist programs, such as Rythu Bandhu, KCR Kits, Aasara Pensions, and Kalyana Lakshmi/Shaadi Mubarak.

Expecting a tough fight from BJP, Chandrashekhar-led BRS already announced candidates for 115 seats on August 21. It has said it will run on its own and will keep working with the All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM), which has seven seats, in a friendly way. It's a good sign that the BRS has 104 members in the Assembly, even though it may not win as many as it did last time.

People who want to join but didn't make the list are giving head ache to BRS. Former BRS leader Mynampally Hanumanth Rao recently joined Congress.