That’s a wrap from us
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To read more about the third phase of India’s mammoth national election, you can access our explainer here. The fourth phase of the multiphase election will be held on May 13.
Here’s what happened today
We will be closing this live page soon. Here is a recap of today’s events:
- As of 3pm local time (09:30 GMT), voter turnout was around 51 percent, with the highest recorded in the state of West Bengal, and the lowest in the western state of Maharashtra.
- Prime Minister Modi cast his vote in Gandhinagar constituency where his number two, Home Minister Amit Shah, is the BJP candidate.
- Congress party’s former President Sonia Gandhi says Modi and his BJP are promoting “hatred for political gain”, adding that their focus is “only on gaining power at any cost”.
- Samajwadi Party leader Akhilesh Yadav says he hopes India’s election body will take action against complaints of booth capturing by the workers of the governing BJP, according to the India Today network.
- An Indian court extended the pre-trial detention of opposition leader and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal until May 20.
- Is today’s India more unequal than under British rule?
- In 2014, Narendra Modi swept to power in India with his BJP pitching him as an economic reformer who would root out corruption and rescue the aspirations of India’s middle class from the clutches of elites – as well as the hellscape of rising prices and unemployment.
- Ten years later, as Modi contests a rare third term, the gap between rich and poor in India – already significant in 2014 – has widened into a canyon, economic researchers warn. India’s income and wealth inequality have become among the highest in the world, worse than in Brazil, South Africa and the United States, reveals a new study by the World Inequality Lab (WIL).
- As India votes to choose its next government, the research in the recently published The Rise of the Billionaire Raj shows income inequality in the country is worse than it was under British colonial rule.
- The study was co-authored by Nitin Kumar Bharti from New York University’s Abu Dhabi campus; Lucas Chancel from Harvard Kennedy School; and Thomas Piketty as well as Anmol Somanchi of the Paris School of Economics.
- Suspected Kashmir rebels killed
- Two people were killed in Indian-administered Kashmir during a firefight with Indian soldiers, police said, at a time when campaigning for the national election is under way in the disputed territory.
- Soldiers besieged a residential area in southern Kulgam district, some 70km (43 miles) from Kashmir’s biggest city Srinagar, on Monday after armed fighters were suspected of sheltering in a house.
- Kashmir is divided between India and Pakistan since their independence in 1947, with both claiming the Himalayan territory in full.
- Rebel groups opposed to Indian rule have for decades carried out a rebellion in Indian-administered Kashmir, demanding either independence or a merger with Pakistan.
- The conflict has killed tens of thousands of civilians, soldiers and fighters.
