Byelection to the Madhupur Assembly seat will be held on April 17 along with two parliamentary seats in Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka and 13 other Assembly seats, the Election Commission of India announced on Tuesday.

According to the commission, a gazette notification for the elections would be issued on March 23 while the last date for nomination has been fixed on March 30. After scrutiny of the forms on March 31, withdrawals can be done till April 3. Results will be announced on April 2.

The Madhupur seat in Jamtara district in Jharkhand’s Santhal Parganas fell vacant last year after the demise of former minority affairs minister Haji Hussain Ansari, who died of post Covid complications. In January, chief minister Hemant Soren inducted Haji’s son, Hafizul Hassan, into his cabinet. He will be the JMM's candidate for the seat. Haji won from Madhupur as a JMM candidate four times since he first contested in 1995. He was also the first Muslim to become minister in the state after its formation in 2000.

Since coming to power in 2019, Madhupur will be third byelection for the Hemant Soren led JMM-Congress-RJD coalition government. The two byepolls held in Dumka and Bermo last year were clinched by the ruling alliance. In Dumka, the chief minister's younger brother Basant Soren won on a JMM ticket while in Bermo, Congress’s Anup Singh emerged victorious. Both were debutants in electoral politics.

Reacting to the poll announcement, the ruling alliance sounded more than hopeful of winning. JMM general secretary Supriyo Bhattacharjee said, “Madhupur has traditionally been our stronghold and we shall certainly win riding on the good work done by our government.”