The Indian state of Maharashtra has a bicameral legislature, comprising two houses. The lower house, known as the Legislative Assembly ("Vidhan Sabha" in Marathi), is directly elected by the people and is the more powerful of the two houses. The upper house, known as the Legislative Council ("Vidhan Parishad" in Marathi) is elected indirectly by several specially designated electorates.

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Quick Facts All 288 seats to the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly 145 seats needed for a majority, Turnout ...

2014 Maharashtra Assembly election

← 2009 15 October 2014 2019 →
All 288 seats to the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly 145 seats needed for a majority
Opinion polls
Turnout	63.38% (3.70%)
Majority party Minority party Third party   Leader Devendra Fadnavis[1] Uddhav Thackeray Prithviraj Chavan[2] Party BJP SHS INC Alliance NDA NDA UPA Leader's seat Nagpur South West[3] Did Not Contest Karad South[4] Last election 46 seats 44 seats 82 seats Seats won 122 63 42 Seat change 76 19 40 Popular vote 14,709,276 10,235,970 9,496,095 Percentage 27.81% 19.35% 17.95% Swing 13.79 pp 3.09 pp 3.06 pp   Fourth party   Leader Ajit Pawar[5] Party NCP Alliance UPA Leader's seat Baramati[6] Last election 62 seats Seats won 41 Seat change 21 Popular vote 9,122,285 Percentage 17.24% Swing 0.87 pp
All Party Results Seats Won by the Bharatiya Janata Party Seats won by the Shiv Sena Seats won by the INC Seats won by the NCP Results of 2014 Maharashtra Vidhan Sabha Elections
Chief Minister before election Prithviraj Chavan INC Elected Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis[1] BJP

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The Legislative Assembly has a tenure of five years, at most, and it may be dissolved before time in case the government falls for lack of majority, and nobody else can cobble up a majority. The Assembly has a strength of 288 seats, each seat being a geographical constituency.

The term of the Legislative Assembly of Maharashtra was due to expire on 8 November 2014. By virtue of its powers, duties and functions under Article 324 read with Article 172(1) of the Constitution of India and Section 15 of Representation of the People Act, 1951, the Election Commission of India is required to hold elections to constitute the new Legislative Assembly in the State of Maharashtra during a window of time which is: between six months before and six months after the date of expiry. Elections are almost invariably held before the expiry of the term, rather than afterwards.

The Model Code of Conduct comes into effect the day that the election commission announces the schedule of elections. This happened on 12 September 2014. The required Gazette Notification was issued on 20 September 2014. The legislative assembly election was held on 15 October 2014, in a single phase, to select the 288 members of the Maharashtra Legislative Assembly in India. The result was announced on 19 October,^[7] with the BJP getting a plurality. The term of the current 13th Legislative Assembly is to end on November 9, 2019, as the first meeting of the new house was held on November 10, 2014.

After the landslide victory of BJP in 2014 Indian general election under the leadership of Narendra Modi , BJP won majority seats in the state and formed government with Shivsena by reviving there grand old alliance. Congress-NCP alliance was not able to attain majority due to decreasing popularity of UPA government and massive corruption. However Nationalist Congress Party offered outside support to BJP for forming government but latter rejected

Following the NCP-INC alliance's performance in the 2014 Indian general election, the NCP demanded 144 seats to contest and a rotation of the Chief Minister's post between parties. Both parties held negotiations but failed to reach a conclusion. The INC declared its list of candidates for 118 seats on 25 September without consulting the NCP. Thus, the NCP unilaterally severed its 15-year-old alliance with the INC. The INC later reached out to the Samajwadi Party (SP) to form an alliance.^[8][9]

The Shiv Sena and Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP) were alliance partners for 25-years - including several smaller parties, such as Republican Party of India (Athavale), Swabhimani Shetkari Sanghatna, Rashtriya Samaj Paksha,^{[citation needed]} were also a part. After the general election, the BJP demanded additional seats to contest; initially they requested 144 seats but later reduced their demand to 130 seats. The Shiv Sena offered 119 seats to the BJP and 18 seats to four other allies, keeping 151 to contest itself. After several rounds of negotiations, the parties did not reach a conclusion. Thus the Shiv Sena - BJP alliance ended on the 25 September as well after 25 years of togetherness.^[9][10]

A total of 3255 candidates contested the election.voter turnout was 64%.^[15] Voter-verified paper audit trail (VVPAT) along with EVMs was used in 13 constituencies:^[16] Wardha, Amravati (2 pockets),^[17] Yavatmal, Chandrapur, Nashik (3 pockets), Aurangabad (3 pockets) and Ahmednagar (2 pockets).^{[18][19][20][21][22][23][16][24]}

List of Political Parties participated in 2014 Maharashtra Assembly Elections.