Civic polls in 48 Jharkhand urban local bodies on Feb 23
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Ranchi: The Jharkhand State Election Commission (SEC) on Tuesday announced that elections to 48 urban local bodies (ULBs), including Ranchi, will be held on February 23 in a single phase, with counting of votes scheduled for February 27.
State Election Commissioner Alka Tiwari said the notification for the civic polls has been issued. The nomination process will begin on January 29 and continue till February 4. Scrutiny of nominations will take place on February 5, while February 6 has been fixed as the last date for withdrawal of candidature. Election symbols will be allotted on February 7.
More than 43.33 lakh voters, including 21.26 lakh women, are eligible to cast their votes in the elections covering 1,087 wards across nine municipal corporations, 20 nagar parishads and 19 nagar panchayats.
Tiwari said elections for mayor or chairman posts, as well as ward councillors, will be held through direct voting, while deputy mayors and vice chairmen will be elected indirectly.
She clarified that the ULB elections in Jharkhand will be conducted on a non-party basis, though candidates may be supported by political parties. In 2018, elections to municipal corporations and councils were held on party lines, but after coming to power in 2019, the Hemant Soren government amended the rules to shift to non-party polls. Both the Congress, a constituent of the ruling Jharkhand Mukti Morcha-led alliance, and the main opposition Bharatiya Janata Party had demanded elections on a party basis.
Following the issuance of the notification, the model code of conduct has come into force in all 48 urban local bodies, excluding panchayat and cantonment areas. Voting will be conducted using ballot papers, and there will be no option for NOTA, the SEC said.
The commission assured adequate security arrangements for peaceful polling at 4,304 polling booths. Of these, 896 booths have been identified as hyper-sensitive and 2,445 as sensitive.
The SEC has also fixed expenditure limits for candidates. According to the notification, candidates contesting for mayoral posts in municipal corporations with a population of over 10 lakh can spend up to ₹25 lakh, while the limit is ₹15 lakh for corporations with a population below 10 lakh. For chairman posts in nagar parishads and nagar panchayats, the spending cap ranges between ₹5 lakh and ₹10 lakh depending on population size. Ward councillor candidates can spend between ₹1 lakh and ₹5 lakh, based on population.
The announcement comes amid scrutiny from the Jharkhand High Court, which had earlier criticised the state government over delays in conducting local body elections. In November 2025, the commission had informed the court that it would complete formalities and issue the notification within eight weeks.
Elections to 14 urban local bodies have been pending since May 2020, while polls to the remaining 34 ULBs have been due since April 2023. At present, all civic bodies in the state are being run by government-appointed officials.
With PTI inputs