The counting of votes to declare the results for the elections to the nine municipal corporations, 20 municipal councils and 19 nagar panchayats in Jharkhand was held on Friday (February 27). This includes the Ranchi Municipal Corporation, which has a total of 54 seats: 53 ward councillor seats and one mayoral seat. In the previous local body elections held in Jharkhand in 2018, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Asha Lakra won the mayor's post, defeating Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) candidate Varsha Gaadi. Similarly, BJP leader Sanjiv Vijaywargiya had won the deputy mayor's post after defeating Congress candidate Rajesh Kumar Gupta.
Meanwhile, the polling for all nine municipal corporations, 20 municipal councils and 19 nagar panchayats was held in Jharkhand on Monday (February 23). Accordingly, a voter turnout of 62 per cent was recorded, with Ranchi Municipal Corporation registering the lowest turnout in the state at 43.35 per cent. The highest turnout, as per the Jharkhand State Election Commission (SEC), was recorded at the Seraikela Nagar Panchayat at 74.86 per cent.
In these elections, more than 43 lakh people were eligible to exercise their franchise to decide the fate of around 6,000 candidates. For the posts of mayor and chairperson, as many as 562 candidates, including 235 women, are in the fray. A total of 4,307 polling booths, including 896 hyper-sensitive and 2,445 sensitive, were set up for the local body elections in Jharkhand.