Meghalaya polls to be held in February

SHILLONG: Meghalaya polls will be held sometime in February along with two other states, Tripura and Nagaland.
An election official said on Saturday that while Himachal Pradesh polls will be held on November 9 and counting of votes on December 18, the Gujarat polls will be held before the results in Himachal.
After these two states, the three states which will go to polls in the next phase are Meghalaya, Tripura, and Nagaland.
Meghalaya went to the polls last time on February 23, 2013, and the new government was formed on March 5.
Though there are talks about simultaneous polls for both Lok Sabha and Legislative Assemblies sometime in 2018, this is unlikely in the near future as the states which are going to polls have not been informed about the matter, the election official said.
The official added that February is the conducive time for Meghalaya following Christmas and New Year.
Chief Electoral Officer Frederick Kharkongor, who is camping in Gujarat to understand the election preparedness in that state, however, refused to comment on the schedule of the Meghalaya polls.
“I came to Gujarat as part of the plan of the Election Commission of India to familiarise with the preparations for polls here and to assess the level of preparedness since we are also preparing for the polls,” Kharkongor said.
An official source said that a team of Election Commission of India is expected to visit Meghalaya after Diwali as part of assessing the preparedness of the State to hold polls.