INDIA: Voting ended Sunday in India’s most acrimonious election in decades, one that will decide whether the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) of Prime Minister Narendra Modi gets a second term in power.
As the final polling booths closed, a huge security cordon was thrown around the voting machines and boxes of paper ballots used for the world’s biggest election before the official count starts on Thursday.
Several early exit polls released by Indian media predicted that Modi’s right-wing Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) will lose seats but with allies would still secure a majority of the 542 seats fought.
The opposition Congress party was predicted to more than double its 2014 tally of 42 seats. The polls have in the past been notoriously unreliable, however, adding to the political jitters.
Tens of thousands of police and paramilitaries were on duty in West Bengal state -- a symbol of the mounting tensions between the BJP and opposition parties during the six weeks of voting that has focused on Modi’s record since his landslide win five years ago.
Long queues formed outside polling stations across the eastern state but the BJP and its rivals again accused each other of using violence, fraud and intimidation.
An improvised bomb was thrown at one Kolkata polling station and security forces intervened to stop BJP, communist and other groups blocking different booths across the state capital that was hit by two days of street battles last week.
In Madhya Pradesh state, in central India, a BJP worker was allegedly shot dead by a Congress official in Indore district before polls closed, police Senior Superintendant Ruchivardhan Mishra told the Press Trust of India.
Fighting between BJP and rival party workers was also reported in northern Punjab state.
Conjoined twins Sabah and Farah voted in the city of Patna in eastern Bihar state and 102-year-old Shyam Saran Negi, who has taken part in every vote since independence in 1947, cast his ballot in mountainous Himachal Pradesh state, highlighting the huge diversity of the exercise.
Modi’s constituency in Varanasi, the Hindu holy city in northern Uttar Pradesh state, was also among those to vote.
Most attention has focused on the BJP campaign to project Modi’s strongman image, playing up recent cross-border air strikes against Pakistan.
The opposition, led by Congress and its leader Rahul Gandhi, have accused him of pursuing divisive policies, neglecting the economy and leaving many farmers in ruin.
Modi and Gandhi have hurled near daily insults at each other with the prime minister calling his rival a “fool” while Gandhi derides Modi as a “thief”.
The animosity has taken a toll on voters.
Writing in the Hindustan Times, political commentator Karan Thapar said Modi’s message “played on our insecurities and strummed upon our deep inner fears”. He said Gandhi’s campaign was “not great”. Pollsters say Modi remains personally popular.
The 68-year-old held 142 rallies across India during the campaign, sometimes five a day, but pollsters predicted before Sunday that the BJP could lose a big chunk of the 282 seats it won in 2014. - AFP