Jharkhand Election Phase 1: Key Candidates and Their Constituencies

In one of the most heated elections that the state of Jharkhand has witnessed, the first phase of the elections for 81 assembly segments is underway today.  In this phase, 43 constituencies are going to vote having 683 candidates in the fray, including 609 men and 73 women. The first phase is being conducted through around 15,000 polling stations, among which around 12,000 are in rural areas and 2,600 in urban areas. 

The first phase has 20 seats reserved for ST (Schedule Caste) and 6 for SC (Schedule Castes). The remaining 17 seats are the general seats. Among the 43 seats, some of the important seats are Kodarma, Saraikella, Ranchi, Barkatha, Barhi, Barkagaon, Hazaribagh, Simaria (SC), Potka (ST), Chatra (SC), Jugsalai (SC), Ghatsila (ST) and Jamshedpur East. 

Saraikella: the Interesting Fight

Saraikella turns out to witness the most interesting fight where transient CM and former JMM leader Champai Soren is fighting in a BJP ticket. On his opposition is Ganesh Mahali, who is a former BJP leader and joined JMM as recently as October after Soren’s candidature became clear.

Champai Soren has been winning from Saraikella since 2009 as a JMM candidate while Ganesh Mahali has been consistently at the second position as a BJP candidate in the 2014 and 2019 Jharkhand elections. In 2014, Mahali gave a tough fight to Soren with over 93,000 votes in his favour while Soren polled over 94,000 votes. In 2019 the gap between the two increased with Soren sweeping the seat with over 1,11,000 votes. It will be interesting to see who the victor becomes this time from among the two long-time contenders.

Ranchi, Jamshedpur East & West

In the Ranchi seat, Congress is betting on the fight with its candidate Mahua Maji, an RS MP. Maji was a Congress candidate in the previous two elections in 2014 and 2019 where he took on C P Singh of BJP and lost on both occasions. However, in 2019, Maji appeared gaining strength and gave C P Singh a tough fight. The difference in votes obtained by the two candidates was just 6,000.

Also Read: Jharkhand: Himanta Finds an Election Issue in Muslims

Jamshedpur East seat had been a BJP stronghold since Jharkhand became a separate state in 2000 in the form of Raghubar Das, who was also the CM of the state. This time Raghubar Das’s daughter-in-law Purnima Das Sahu is the BJP’s candidate against Ajoy Kumar of Congress. Raghubar Das’s legacy was challenged in 2019 when independent candidate Saryu Roy defeated him with a margin of over 15,000 votes. Raghubar Das was the incumbent CM and he is the governor of Odisha currently. Congress has always had a tough time in this seat. 

Saryu Roy is fighting in Jamshedpur West this time on a JD(U) ticket. Roy was previously with the BJP and resigned from the party in 2019 when he won the Jamshedpur East seat. This year he joined JD(U) and is fighting against Congress’s Banna Gupta, the health minister of Jharkhand. 

Jaganathpur

The Jaganthpur seat was once represented by Madhu Koda, one of the very controversial chief ministers of Jharkhand. This assembly seat was won by Geeta Koda, the wife of Madhu Koda in 2009 and 2014 as a candidate of the Jai Bharat Samanta Party. In 2019 the seat went to Congress when Sona Ram Sinku registered a victory against Mangal Singh Bobonga of JVM (P) as his immediate contender.

This time Geeta Koda is fighting on a BJP ticket against incumbent Congress MLA Sona Ram Sinku. Koda joined the BJP in early this year.

Also Read: Jharkhand: Who Is BJP's Gamaliel Hembram Fielded Against Hemant Soren?