{"id":11379,"date":"2014-04-07T10:02:34","date_gmt":"2014-04-07T10:02:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/4cd.e16.myftpupload.com\/?p=11379"},"modified":"2014-04-07T10:02:34","modified_gmt":"2014-04-07T10:02:34","slug":"india-begins-giant-general-election","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/?p=11379","title":{"rendered":"India begins giant general election"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"INDIA\"<\/a>
Assam is a Congress party stronghold but the opposition BJP is hoping to make inroads<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Indians have begun voting in the world’s biggest election, with the ruling Congress party pitted against the Hindu nationalist BJP opposition.<\/p>\n

The nine-phase ballot begins on Monday and concludes on 12 May. Votes will be counted on 16 May.<\/p>\n

More than 800 million Indians are eligible to vote in a poll dominated by corruption and high inflation.<\/p>\n

A new anti-corruption party, the AAP, is also contesting the elections after a spectacular result in local polls.<\/p>\n

The AAP (Aam Aadmi, or Common Man’s Party) made a strong showing at the state assembly polls in the capital, Delhi, and is standing for all the seats in the parliament.<\/p>\n

Several smaller regional parties are also in the fray and if no single party wins a clear majority, they could play a crucial role in government formation.<\/p>\n

The Lok Sabha (lower house of parliament) has 543 elected seats and any party or a coalition needs a minimum of 272 MPs to form a government.<\/p>\n

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has already said he is stepping down and the Congress is being led by Rahul Gandhi, the latest member of India’s influential Nehru-Gandhi dynasty.<\/p>\n

The BJP is being led by the charismatic and controversial Hindu nationalist leader Narendra Modi. Mr Modi, who is ahead in all the pre-election surveys, is the leader of Gujarat state, which witnessed one of India’s worst anti-Muslim riots in 2002.<\/p>\n

Some 814 million voters – 100 million more than at the last elections in 2009 – are eligible to vote at 930,000 polling stations, up from 830,000 polling stations in 2009.<\/p>\n

Electronic voting machines will be used and will, for the first time, contain a None of the Above (Nota) button – an option for voters who do not want to cast their ballot for any of the candidates.<\/p>\n

On the first day of voting, polling is taking place in six constituencies in two states in the north-east – five in Assam and one in Tripura.<\/p>\n

The BBC’s Sanjoy Majumder in Assam says the first voters have cast their ballots in the state, with many others queuing up outside polling stations.<\/p>\n

“We need good people in government,” said a woman voter, who had queued up outside a high school for girls where polling was taking place.<\/p>\n

The area is dotted with plantations growing the world-famous Assam tea and has more than six million eligible voters.<\/p>\n

Many of them say they are disenchanted with rising prices and a feeling that this part of India has been neglected by politicians because of its distance from Delhi, our correspondent says.<\/p>\n

Assam is a Congress party stronghold but the opposition BJP is hoping to make inroads.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Source: BBC<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Indians have begun voting in the world’s biggest election, with the ruling Congress party pitted against the Hindu nationalist BJP opposition. The nine-phase ballot begins on Monday and concludes on 12 May. Votes will be counted on 16 May. More than 800 million Indians are eligible to vote in a poll dominated by corruption and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":11381,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[14],"class_list":["post-11379","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-papa-owusu-ankomah"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11379","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11379"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11379\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/11381"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11379"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11379"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11379"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}