New York

Some analysts and western diplomats believe that a resounding victory (for the BJP-led alliance) this time would give the government more room to take politically risky steps. On the domestic front, it could move more aggressively, for example, to shut down money-losing state enterprises and encourage foreign investment. In foreign policy, it would have more leeway to reopen talks with Pakistan, sign the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty and improve relations with the United States on trade and security issues.

But most agree that even gaining a big majority would not free Vajpayee's Hindu nationalist BJP, the largest partner in the coalition, to pursue its religiously divisive agenda, which includes building a Hindu temple on the site of a destroyed mosque and subordinating Muslim personal law to India's civil code. The party will still be dependent on regional allies -- for example, the Telugu Desam Party in southern Andhra Pradesh -- that count on the votes ofMuslims, are committed to secularism and would almost certainly quit the coalition if the more vociferous Hindu nationalists were given free rein.

The factors underlying the coalition's apparent electoral gains are various. The soaring price of vegetables that had led to such disastrous results for the Hindu nationalists in state elections last November have come down. In fact, inflation, a potent political issue here, is low. Industrial growth is on the upswing and this season's normal monsoon will help ensure that agricultural production in this predominantly rural nation is strong.

Much attention has been lavished on Vajpayee's deft diplomatic handling of a small war in Kashmir that ended with India's repelling Pakistani-backed forces from its territory, and that victory does seem to have burnished his popularity.

But in interviews in villages and cities in southern, western and northern India, voters almost never raised the Kashmir conflict as a decisive issue. Usually, they were motivated by local,bread-and-butter issues or the interests of their own caste or religious group.