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Thursday, January 1, 1998 Published at 20:55 GMT
World: S/W Asia
Date set for Indian elections
![image: [ Some 600 million people will be able to vote in the polls ]](/olmedia/images/_44010_election.jpg)
Some 600 million people will be able to vote in the polls
The election commission in India has announced the polling dates for the forthcoming general election.
The country's 600 million electors will vote on the February 16, 22, and 28, and March 7.
The election was called after the United Front government lost the support of the Congress party in a row over allegations that a coalition partner, the DMK, had links with the assassins of the former prime minister and Congress leader, Rajiv Gandhi.
The sheer number of voters mean the poll will have to be carried out over several days. Time is also needed for the ballot boxes to be delivered to the various counting-stations.
Some 209 political parties are expected to take part in the campaign.
The key players will be the right-wing BJP, the largest party in the previous parliament, the United Front Coalition, which had been in power for the last 18, and the Congress Party.
The Congress Party had supported the United Front government but brought about its collapse over a report into the assassination of Rajiv Gandhi which linked one of the United Front partners with the suspected assassins, the Tamil Tigers of Sri Lanka.
The election itself is a mammoth task. Eight hundred thousand polling-stations will be set up at a cost of $179m.
When it is over, India will know whether it will be in for more unstable coalitions, or whether one party will finally take over and bring back some kind of stability.
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