India's most populous state of Uttar Pradesh began voting on Thursday in the first of a series of local elections that will be a key test of the popularity of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his ruling party.
With a population almost as big as that of Brazil, keeping power in the bellwether state would give the Bharatiya Janata Party a boost in its bid for a third successive victory at nationwide parliamentary polls due by 2024.
"If the BJP loses, especially in UP, that will be a big setback," said Rahul Verma, a fellow at New Delhi-based think-tank Centre for Policy Research. "But you can call this a semi-final. The game in 2024 will be very, very different." Failure to do so would lead to more questions over the leadership of Rahul Gandhi, whose father, grandmother and great-grandfather have all served as prime ministers but who has struggled to dent Modi's high ratings.During campaigning, the BJP has appealed to large Hindu majorities in the northern states of Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand. Both are home to important holy sites, some of which are disputed by Hindus and minority Muslims.
Congress and activists have criticised the approach, saying that it risks stoking communal tensions that have flared up into deadly violence in the past.
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