Politics

Gowda, a former Karnataka chief minister, also said the stage would be ready for the formation of a new government in the state after that.

LK Advani, Arun Jaitley, Sumitra Mahajan, Murli Manohar Joshi are among the heavyweights who were dropped from the fray.

The campaign, brought back the BJP from its loss in the Assembly elections less than six months ago, and put it on a strong footing. It gave heft to the BJP’s push to retain electoral dominance.

Ashok Lavasa had dissented on a series of clean chits given by the Commission to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and BJP president Amit Shah on their speeches during the election campaign.

The BJP has increased its vote share in last year's panchayat polls in Bankura at the cost of the Left, but hastened to add that this does not mean that the saffron party will be able to gain in the Lok Sabha elections.

Earlier in the day, the Election Commission had issued a statement rubbishing allegations of EVM tampering by several opposition parties across the country.

The Kurmi community was also the key political force that helped Mamata Banarjee defeat the Left Front candidate after 42 years in 2014.

This is not the first time that the Congress government is facing hardship. Rajasthan and Karnataka continue to be their trouble areas, and attempts to topple the governments may gain vigour if the party fails to make an impact on May 23.

Ernakulum has been the traditional bastion of Congress. Congress has lost Ernakulum Lok Sabha Constituency only thrice since 1952.

The meeting comes a day after Naidu met Congress president Rahul Gandhi and UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi in an attempt to cobble up a third front against the BJP ahead of the Lok Sabha election results on May 23.

Earlier on Monday, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath recommended to governor immediate sacking of Rajbhar, also the Suheldev Bhartiya Samaj Party (SBSP) chief, from his cabinet for his outbursts against senior NDA partner BJP.

While some have given an edge to the mahagathbandhan, the others have predicted BJP way ahead in UP. On the other hand, the exit polls have shown BJP climbing down to 71 seats from 80 it had won in the state in last general polls.

The meeting was being seen as an effort to push for an anti-NDA bloc ahead of the Lok Sabha election result on May 23.

The BJP is set to win 20-23 seats out of the 28 with a vote share of 54.47%, while the UPA will wrest five to eight seats with 41.85% of the votes.

The News18-IPSOS exit poll has predicted that the BJP will win 8-10 seats Lok Sabha seats in Assam, while the Congress is likely to be a distant second with 2-4 seats.

Some of the exit polls have even projected that the Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance will get more than 300 seats to comfortably cross the majority mark of 272 in the Lok Sabha.