New Delhi, Apr 2 : The Election Commission of India on Wednesday announced that the Assembly elections in Karnataka would be held on May 10, 16 and 22.

Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) N Gopalaswami said that the counting of votes for the 224 Assembly seats would take place on May 25.

Thirty-six seats of the state Assembly are reserved for the Scheduled Castes (SC) and 15 are reserved for Scheduled Tribes (ST).

With the announcement of the dates, the Model Code of Conduct comes into immediate effect.

The issue of notification for the first phase of polls will be April 16 and the last date of filing of nominations will be April 23. Scrutiny will be done the next day and last date of withdrawal will be April 26.

For the second phase, nominations will begin on April 22 and will end on April 29 followed by scrutiny the next day. The last date for withdrawal of nominations will be May 2.

Nominations in the final phase will begin on April 26 and the last date for nominations will be May 3. Scrutiny will take place on May 5 and the last date for withdrawal will be May 7.

As per these rolls, there are 40,077,666 electors of which 20,399,338 are male and 19,678,328 female.

Electors Photo Identity Cards (EPIC) coverage of the electors in Karnataka is around 62 per cent.

There are 39,758 polling stations in the state. Besides, the District Election Officers

(DEO) have been authorized to propose setting up of auxiliary polling stations wherever needed from voter’s convenience point of view.

For the facility of disabled persons, instructions have been issued to ensure that all polling stations are located at ground floor and ramps are provided.

Karnataka came under President's rule in November last year after the collapse of the BJP-JDS coalition Government. (ANI)