Maharashtra votes to be counted Sunday

The stage is set Sunday for the counting of votes for the Maharashtra assembly elections held Oct 15.

The vote count of the 13th assembly will decide the contours of the 288-member house.

The counting will commence 8 a.m., initial trends shall be available by 10 a.m., clear trends by noon and the final results are likely to roll out soon thereafter, officials said.

Amid tight security, all preparations for the counting have been made in 36 district headquarters across the state.

Around 64 percent of the state's 8.35 crore voters exercised their franchise to choose lawmakers from among 4,119 candidates at more than 91,000 polling stations Wednesday.

The Congress-Nationalist Congress Party combine ruled the state for three consecutive terms, while the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Shiv Sena coalition remained in the opposition for 15 years.

Barely three weeks before the election, the two major alliances collapsed and the four parties contested alone. Also in the fray was the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) of Raj Thackeray.

In the 2009 assembly poll, the Congress was the largest party with 82 members followed by the NCP with 62, the Shiv Sena with 46, the BJP with 45, the MNS with 13 and the rest belonging to smaller parties and independents.

In the absence of any pre-poll alliances this time, the outcome will be crucial for the future of all the parties and the survival of parties like MNS.

The Congress fielded 287 candidates, the BJP and its allies 287, the Shiv Sena 282, the NCP 278 and the MNS 219.

Depending on the poll outcome, the state may witness unprecedented political permutations and combinations, with the possibility of poaching or horse-trading also not ruled out.

The fate of top Congress and NCP candidates like former chief ministers Prithviraj Chavan, Ashok Chavan, Narayan Rane, former ministers Patangrao Kadam, Ajit Pawar, R.R. Patil, Sunil Tatkare and others on the line.

From the BJP, the prime contenders are Devendra Fadnavis, Vinod Tawade, Eknath Khadse and Pankaja Munde - incidentally, all are also in the running for the post of chief minister.

Though senior leaders of both the Shiv Sena and the MNS are in the fray, the chief ministerial hopefuls and party chieftains - cousins Uddhav Thackeray and Raj Thackeray - did not contest.

The results of several exit polls have indicated the BJP emerging as the largest single party or managing to secure a majority, but the Congress-NCP have dismissed all surveys.

The BJP had deployed its top leaders, including party chief Amit Shah, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, cabinet ministers, party leaders at the state and central levels and chief ministers of BJP-ruled states for the no-holds barred month-long campaign.

Though the BJP is confidently looking ahead at forming a government independently, there is also talk of a possible patch-up with its erstwhile ally of 25 years, the Shiv Sena.