New Delhi: Campaigning for the second phase of the April 23 Lok Sabha elections in 141 seats ended on Tuesday, keeping heavyweights like Rahul Gandhi, Sharad Pawar, Ram Vilas Paswan and Sushma Swaraj waiting for the voters verdict.
Congress President Sonia Gandhi rooted for her son Rahul's re-election bid, while his sister Priyanka too hit the campaign trail asking voters to ensure a mandate for him from Amethi - once represented by her late father Rajiv Gandhi and later by her mother.
At the end of the second phase, polls would be completed to 265 seats, just seven short of the magic number that parties need to form a government in the 545-member house. Elections are held to only 543 seats, as two members are nominated from the Anglo-Indian community.
Pawar is contesting from the newly created seat of Madha in Maharashtra, Swaraj from Vidisha in Madhya Pradesh and Paswan from Hajipur in Bihar. Union Commerce and Industry Minister Kamal Nath is contesting from Chhindwara constituency in Madhy Pradesh.
A total of 2,041 candidates, including 121 women, are in the fray in this round. The States to be covered are Andhra Pradesh 20 Lok Sabha seats, Assam 11, Bihar 13, Goa two, Jammu and Kashmir one, Karnataka 17, Madhya Pradesh 13, Maharashtra 25, Manipur one, Orissa 11, Tripura two, Uttar Pradesh 17 and Jharkhand eight.
Other prominent names in the second phase include Akhilesh Prasad Singh (Purvi Champaran, Bihar), Raghuvansh Prasad Singh (Vaishali, Bihar) and Raghunath Jha (Valmikinagar, Bihar).
One parliamentary seat in Manipur that falls under this phase will, as an exception, witness voting on Wednesday. Campaigning there ended on Monday.
Polling has already been completed to 124 seats in the first round of the five-phase Lok Sabha elections that began on April 16.
Campaigning during the second phase focused on blackmoney stashed abroad and the demolition of Babri Masjid. BJP's prime ministerial candidate L K Advani promised to retrieve billions in blackmoney stored away in Swiss banks if the party was elected to power.
The Congress said the BJP's assumption was based on "bogus" data. The Congress also came under attack from one of its key allies, RJD. Railway Minister and RJD chief Lalu Prasad accused the Congress of also being responsible for the demolition of the 16th century mosque in Ayodhya in Uttar Pradesh.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh hit back, saying the only mistake of the Congress was to have taken the assurance given by the then UP government to the Supreme Court on face value.
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The UP government led by chief minister Kalyan Singh in 1992 had assured that it would take steps to protect the Mughal-era mosque.
The round two elections will see polling completed to the state Assemblies of Andhra Pradesh (140 seats) and Orissa (77 seats).
The Andhra Assembly elections will decide the fate of Chief Minister Y S Rajasekhara Reddy, his rival Chandrababu Naidu and actor-turned-politician Chiranjeevi among others.
In Orissa, BJD chief Naveen Patnaik is aiming for a third straight term in office.
As many as 11 Lok Sabha and 77 Assembly constituencies of the state are going to the second phase of polls in which the fate of former Union ministers Braja Kishore Tripathy (Puri), Arjun Sethi (Bhadrak) and Srikanta Jena (Balasore) as also a number of state ministers will be decided.
In Bihar, where 13 out of 40 Lok Sabha seats, are going to polls, George Fernandes, the once fiery socialist, is also in the fray from Muzaffarpur, as an Independent, the seat he won in 1977, 1980, 1989, 1991 and 2004.
In Karnataka, where the BJP is trying to defend its turf, the party's prime ministerial candidate L K Advani led the campaign. He visited the state twice to canvass for votes for the party candidates including BJP National General Secretary H N Ananthkumar (Bangalore South).
Advani, who was in Bangalore on Tuesday, asserted that the NDA would emerge as the largest alliance in the Lok Sabha polls.
"Also it seems to the me the BJP along with its allies" will be the largest alliance in Parliament", he said but declined to predict the numbers.
Advani said he lamented the absence of A B Vajpayee during campaign due to ill-health.
Congress President Sonia Gandhi and her son Rahul Gandhi too criss-crossed various constituencies in Karnataka.
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