Karnataka Assembly Polls: People queue up to cast their votes; high stakes for BJP, Congress

Bengaluru: The polling for the Karnataka Assembly elections began amid tight security on Wednesday.

The voting started at 7 am and will continue till 6 pm. 

All three major political parties in the state -- BJP, Congress and the Janata Dal-Secular (JDS)-- have put in efforts to woo voters, making promises and levelling accusations at each other to secure a majority in the state's 224-seat Assembly.

The Lingayat and Vokkaliga voters will play a major factor in the elections. Lingayats comprise 17 per cent of the population and Vokkaligas 11 per cent. The voting is being held for 224 assembly constituencies in Karnataka with 2,615 candidates in the fray.

The fate of the candidates will be known on May 13, the day of the counting of votes. Polling is scheduled across 58,545 polling stations including auxiliary polling stations.

According to the Election Commission of India, the majority mark to form the government is 113 seats. A total of 42,48,028 new voters have been registered to vote for the assembly elections.