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India voters kick off world's biggest election

AFP, dibrugarh
Indians began voting yesterday in the world's biggest election, which is set to sweep the Hindu nationalist opposition to power at a time of low growth, anger over corruption and warnings about religious unrest.
The 814-million-strong electorate is forecast to inflict a heavy defeat on the Congress party which has ruled for 10 years, and elect hardliner Narendra Modi from the Bharatiya Janata Party.
Men and women were packed tightly into separate queues when polls opened, shuffling slowly into tightly guarded booths to press the button for their candidates on electronic voting machines.
Amit Shah faces a judicial investigation after he reportedly told supporters to see the election as "revenge" against a "government that protects and gives compensation to those who killed Hindus".
Rahul Gandhi, leading Congress into his first national election as scion of the famous dynasty, said Sunday a
victory for Modi threatens India's religious fabric.
"Wherever these people (the opposition BJP) go they create fights. They'll pit Hindus and Muslims against each other," he said.
The BJP said talk of "revenge" was normal ahead of an election and the other remarks were taken out of context.
Prime ministerial front-runner Modi, the hawkish son of a tea seller whose rise has split his party, is a polarising figure due to his alleged links to anti-Muslim riots in 2002.
Modi has urged voters to give him a majority in the 543-seat parliament, in defiance of surveys which repeatedly show the BJP will need coalition partners when results are published on May 16.
In Assam, a Congress stronghold, some disgruntled voters told AFP they had been swayed by his promises of better infrastructure, strong leadership, jobs and a clean administration.
Coupled with a widespread perception that Prime Minister Manmohan
Singh's second term was largely lost to indecision and scandal, Modi has tapped into a groundswell of discontent.
The election will be the biggest in history and is a mind-boggling feat of organisation as voters travel to nearly a million polling stations.
Modi, 20 years older than Gandhi at 63, is still expected to score strongly among the young thanks to his message of aspiration and skills over the left-leaning Congress's pitch of welfare and fair development.
“He (Rahul Gandhi) was born with a golden spoon whereas I grew up selling tea on railway platforms. He has a well-known lineage whereas I am honest," Modi told a campaign rally yesterday.
But many observers worry about his domestic impact in an officially secularcountry.
Modi is steeped in the ideology of Hindu nationalism, which is often antagonistic towards Muslims, and he remains tainted by religious riots in Gujarat in 2002.