THE FIFTH and final round of voting in India’s month-long election ended yesterday, with exit polls forecasting a fractured mandate in which the ruling Congress Party-led coalition will lead over the alliance headed by the Opposition Hindu-nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party, the BJP.
Results will be known on Saturday, and the constitution provides for installation of a new parliament by June 2th, five years after the last.
However, exit polls – banned by the Election Commission during the staggered voting process – indicated the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance would win 189-201 seats, with the BJP-led coalition securing 183-195 seats of the 543 parliamentary seats.
The C-Voter polling agency survey was conducted for India TV and UTV Business and released after the final round of polling last evening.
To secure a majority, a party or coalition needs 272 MPs, a requirement that would force the Congress and BJP to launch a frantic hunt for new allies through backroom deals and promises of high office.
Analysts expect that the weekend, once results are declared, will trigger a frantic round of political horse-trading, as the two main parties scramble for partners from among a multitude of regional parties – all with their local agendas and anxious to grab a slice of the federal pie.
“Everything will depend on numbers,” a shaky prime minister Manmohan Singh acknowledged at a press briefing this week.
The only option open to the two principal rival groupings is the “Third Front”, comprising a handful of regional parties including the Communists, but analysts believe they would be hard-pressed to cobble together the requisite 272 MPs.
Given the indecisive outcome, political observers say that whatever formation emerges to govern India’s 1.2 billion people will be an unwieldy grouping that will struggle to present a united front, at a time when the nuclear-armed nation faces economic, security and foreign policy challenges.
Many even predict a further election within a short period.
The absence of credible leaders and consequent voter apathy posed a problem as a large number of Indians expressed lack of faith in venal, inefficient and self-serving politicians.
“Whatever is coming is not likely to last more than two years,” according to Yashwant Deshmukh, head of the C-Voter polling agency.
Voters in nine states, including the swing state of southern Tamil Nadu, had yesterday completed polling – a process which began on April 16th to allow security forces to move across the vast country and ensure a fair ballot.
Some 55 per cent of India’s 714 million-plus eligible voters – or twice the US population – cast their ballots at more than 828,000 polling stations.