Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee's ruling coalition was looking to today's vote in the key northern state of Uttar Pradesh to help clinch a decisive victory against the opposition Congress party in ongoing national elections.
Today's third round of polling will decide the fates of opposition leader Sonia Gandhi and her son Rahul -- the latest member of the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty to enter politics -- in neighboring constituencies in Uttar Pradesh, a state whose size, history and population have made it a political heavyweight in Indian elections.
Eight of India's 12 prime ministers have come from this northern state of 170 million, which has more than 110 million registered voters and sends 80 lawmakers to parliament.
Also voting today will be Jammu-Kashmir state, where Muslim militants, who have waged a separatist insurgency against Indian rule for 14 years, have called for a boycott of the elections and threatened to kill voters and candidates.
Last month, opinion polls said Vajpayee's multiparty National Democratic Alliance, buoyed by a robust economy and peace talks with Pakistan, would easily cross the 300-seat mark in the 543-seat Lok Sabha or lower house of parliament in the nationwide elections.
But the popularity of the ruling coalition has since waned. Exit polls for the first round of balloting last Tuesday and subsequent surveys show it might not win the majority it needs to form government, forcing Vajpayee to seek the support of smaller parties and independents.
The prime minister has said he hoped to avoid such haggling, which could make his government less stable and sap the momentum from economic reforms.
Yesterday, Vajpayee said "there is no cause for worry."
The elections were "going well, as per our expectations" and "we are confident that we will get a majority," Vajpayee told Press Trust of India news agency in an interview.
An opinion poll on the private Star News television channel predicted late Saturday a 4 percent swing in favor of Gandhi's Congress party and its allies, which could improve their tally to 161-173 seats. It showed Vajpayee's partnership securing 267-279 seats, with no change in its share of the votes.
On Friday, another poll published by The Indian Express newspaper and New Delhi Television News projected the prime minister's coalition could win as little as 255 seats. It was based on an April 8 to April 14 survey of voters eligible to cast ballots today.
The maximum predicted was 275 -- a narrow gap in the poll that claims a 3 percent error margin.
In total, today's voting will be held for 137 constituencies across 11 states, with the most -- 32 -- in Uttar Pradesh, of which Lucknow is the capital.
RSS