Bloomberg News
India's main opposition bloc led by Narendra Modi is poised to win a majority in a national election, most exit polls signaled, boosting his chances of taking power in the world's second-most populous country.
Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party and its allies will win 249 to 340 seats, according to six exit polls today, with 272 needed for a majority. The Congress party and its allies, in power for the past decade, are projected to win 70 to 148 seats. Results will be announced on May 16.
'Let's place people over politics, hope over despair, healing over hurting, inclusion over exclusion and development over divisiveness,' Modi, 63, said in a statement sent by the BJP today. 'It is natural for the spirit of bi-partisanship to get temporarily lost in the midst of an election campaign, but now is the time to regain it.'
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The polls, which have overestimated the BJP's strength in the past two national elections, could further boost Indian stocks and the rupee as investors bet that Modi will revive growth in Asia's third-biggest economy. The tally indicates the best-ever performance for the bloc led by the BJP, a party rooted in Hindu nationalism that has pledged to reduce one of Asia's fastest inflation rates and expedite foreign investment.
'If the BJP and allies win more than 220 seats then Modi will be India's next prime minister,' said A.K. Verma, a political analyst at Christ Church College in Kanpur in Uttar Pradesh, India's most-populous state. In the 2009 election, the Congress alliance won 260 seats and the BJP group took 160.
Stocks Gain
Indian stocks headed to a three-year high in New York and rupee forwards advanced after the exit polls were released. The Bank of New York Mellon India ADR Index jumped 3.2 percent to 1,291.35 at 10:35 a.m. local time, poised for the highest level since April 2011. One-month NDFs on the rupee gained as much as 0.8 percent. The S&P BSE Sensex climbed 2.4 percent to a record 23,551 in Mumbai today and the rupee touched a nine-month high before the exit-poll results.
Nine rounds of voting started on April 7 to pick 543 parliamentary seats. Turnout averaged a record 66.4 percent, the Election Commission of India said today, compared with 58 percent in the 2009 election and the previous high of 64 percent in the 1984 vote.
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The BJP and its allies are forecast to win 289 seats, compared with 101 for the Congress group, Bloomberg TV India reported, citing a Cvoter exit poll. The BJP bloc would win 261 to 283 seats, according to an India Today exit poll, while the Congress-led alliance would win 110 to 120 seats.
Poll Accuracy
A poll by Today's Chanakya showed the BJP and its allies winning 340 seats, compared with 70 seats for the Congress group. An ABP News-Nielsen exit poll forecast Modi's group would win 281 seats, compared with 97 for Congress and its allies.
A Times Now-ORG India exit poll gave 249 to the BJP-led alliance, with 148 going to the ruling party's group. CNN-IBN said the BJP group would win 270 to 282 seats, with the Congress-led alliance taking 92 to 102 seats.
'There has to be an element of caution because their track record at previous elections has been poor,' S. Chandrasekharan, director of the South Asia Analysis Group, said by phone from New Delhi, referring to exit polls. 'They're better at predicting the direction rather than the precise number of seats.'
Market Moves
In the last two elections, exit polls have overestimated the strength of the BJP and its allies -- by about 30 seats in 2009 and as many as 70 seats in 2004. Congress's surprise win to take power a decade ago led to the biggest one-day sell-off of stocks in more than four years, while its re-election in 2009 boosted the stock market by a record 17 percent in the next trading day.
Indian stocks may fall if the BJP-led alliance wins fewer than 230 parliamentary seats, according to a Bloomberg News survey of 19 brokerages and investment advisory firms.
Modi's rise has split the nation of 1.2 billion, where violence between Hindus and Muslims has played a defining role in politics since independence. The chief minister of Gujarat since 2001 has been accused of failing to stop riots in the western state 12 years ago that killed more than 1,000 people, mostly Muslims.
Modi has repeatedly denied the accusations and a Supreme Court-appointed panel found no evidence he gave orders that prevented assistance from reaching those being attacked. Even so, regional party leaders such as Mamata Banerjee have blasted Modi over the riots on the campaign trail and said they wouldn't join a government led by him.
Economic Record
Modi has campaigned on his record in Gujarat, which has outpaced the national economic growth rate in 11 of the past 12 financial years for which data is available.
His main opponent is Rahul Gandhi, the 43-year-old scion of India's foremost political dynasty and vice president of Congress, after Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said in January he wouldn't stand for a third term. Gandhi has been campaigning on the party's record of spending on programs ranging from cheap food to guaranteed work in rural areas.
The victor will need to revive an economy growing close to the slowest pace in a decade. Consumer-price inflation averaged 10 percent last year, eroding purchasing power in a nation where more than 800 million people live on less than $2 a day.
To contact the reporter on this story: Andrew MacAskill in New Delhi at amacaskill@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Daniel Ten Kate at dtenkate@bloomberg.net Peter Hirschberg
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