Opposition leader Modi vows to revive $1t infrastructure program

The biggest general election the world has ever seen begins on Monday in a remote backwater of tea gardens and rice paddies, with India looking increasingly likely to embrace a coalition led by a Hindu nationalist to jumpstart a flagging economy.

India's 815 million voters are set to inflict a resounding defeat on the ruling Congress party, led by the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty, surveys show, after the longest economic slowdown since the 1980s put the brakes on development and job creation in a country where half of the population is under 25 years old.