Modi alliance nears majority

INDIAN Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ruling alliance will be just a few seats short of a majority in parliament, bolstered by a rise in nationalist sentiment over hostilities with arch foe Pakistan, a survey showed yesterday, days before voting begins.

About 900 million people are eligible to vote in the election starting on Thursday, in which Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led group is taking on the Congress and its allies, and a clutch of regional parties.

The election had become tighter because of discontent in the countryside over a weak rural economy and lack of jobs for young people.

The BJP and its allies are expected to win 267 of the 543 parliamentary seats at stake – just five short of the halfway mark required to rule.

Yesterday, the party said it would scrap decades-old special rights for the people of Muslim-majority Jammu and Kashmir, so as to integrate the state more closely with the rest of the country. Political leaders in Muslim-majority Kashmir warned that repealing the law could trigger unrest.