29 Die In India Election Violence
Leftist guerrillas attacked Indian forces protecting polling places in southern India Monday, as election-related violence raised the death toll to 29 in the last two days.
A land mine exploded in the state of Andhra Pradesh, killing five soldiers and injuring 37 others as they deployed at guarded polling stations. Violence related to India's staggered parliamentary election has continued to plague state officials, who reported earlier that seven soldiers had been killed.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but police speculation focused on the outlawed Peoples' War Group, a Maoist rebel organization that has urged a boycott of the elections.
In other election-related violence in Andhra Pradesh, guerrillas detonated a land mine Sunday, killing four election officers and two policemen who were moving ballot boxes to central collection stations, where they will be held until counting begins March 2.
In Nagaland and Mizoram, two remote northeastern states where balloting was continuing today, two men were shot and killed, one of them an election supervisor.
Sporadic violence is a regular feature of Indian elections, where rival parties battle for control of polling stations and anti-government rebels try to disrupt the world's largest democracy. Despite the casualty toll, election officials claim this year is no worse than usual.
Three men were killed in clashes overnight after voting ended in the eastern state of West Bengal. One of the victims was hacked to death, the Press Trust of India reported.
In Sunday's voting in nine states and the small federally administered territory of Pondicherry, 12 people were killed in clashes between rival activists, and more than 40 people were injured. Most of the deaths were in the violence-prone northern state of Bihar.
Twenty-three people were killed in the first phase of voting Feb. 16.
The turnout in the first two rounds was 55 percent -- slightly below average -- with voting completed for three-fourths of the 543 districts at stake. More than 600 million Indians are eligible to vote.
Meanwhile, a court today reinstated the Hindu nationalist government of India's largest state, Uttar Pradesh, two days after its dismissal threatened to overshadow the election.
The state's High Court nullified the decision by Governor Romesh Bhandari to replace the government led by the Bharatiya Janata Party.
Bhandari, who is federally appointed, dismissed the elected BJP government after some of its smaller allies walked out, depriving it of its legislative majority. The governor appointed one of the defectors as the new head of government.
Written by Hema Shukla.
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