SIX INDIAN provinces will begin electing new governments in staggered polling beginning today, in what many believe will be a referendum on prime minister Manmohan Singh's Congress Party-led federal coalition, ahead of general elections scheduled before May 2009.
Against a backdrop of rising food prices and inflation, recurrent terrorist strikes and the adverse local impact of the global financial crisis, voters from Muslim-majority Jammu and Kashmir in the north to Christian-dominated Mizoram in the northeast will cast their ballots.
Voting begins in Maoist insurgency-ridden Chattisgarh province in central India today followed by adjoining Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan state in western India as well as in the capital, New Delhi, later this month.
War-torn Kashmir, where a two-decade long Muslim insurgency against Indian rule has claimed nearly 70,000 lives, will vote in a seven-part election starting next Monday that is likely to see low turnout following a boycott called by separatist leaders.
The main contestants in almost all provinces other than tiny Mizoram bordering Burma remain the Congress and the main Opposition Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party, the BJP.
Also in the fray are a plethora of smaller parties who will play a key role in determining the winners by becoming part of large coalitions.
The upcoming polls, however, are crucial to the Congress Party and the BJP. Congress has ruled Delhi since 1998 and is hoping for another five-year term.
The BJP, on the other had, is trying to wrest Delhi from Congress control and wants to retain Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chattisgarh.
"We consider this a semi-final ahead of the parliamentary elections. We are sure of retaining the states we rule and winning in Delhi too. We are very confident" BJP spokesperson Prakash Javadekar said.
In response Congress leader and junior home minister Shakeel Ahmed said they were equally sure of prevailing in the polls.
"The people want a change and it is only the Congress Party that can bring about a change" he said .