About 900 million citizens will be eligible to vote, 15 million of them aged between 18 and 19, in a mammoth exercise lasting more than a month, Chief Election Commissioner Sunil Arora said at a press briefing in the capital New Delhi on Sunday. Until a few weeks ago, a shortage of jobs and weak farm prices were seen denting Modi’s popularity. Of the 543 parliamentary seats up for grabs, 241 could go to Modi’s ruling alliance, compared with 141 to the Congress party-led opposition alliance, according to a nationwide survey of 50,000 people by the CVoter polling agency conducted over the past four weeks.
