Karnataka

Karnataka will see one of the most exciting contests between BJP and Congress as it always has. Though BJP had 19 out of 28 seats in the 2009 General Elections, last year's assembly elections saw Congress winning 122 out of 224 seats with BJP and JD(S) sharing 40 each. With the Modi factor a key election point for BJP this year, urban constituencies could see BJP holding the edge while Congress still holds sway in most rural constituencies.

Some important constituencies to watch out for -

• Bangalore South - One of the most interesting battles, but I think the 5-time sitting MP Ananth Kumar still has the edge due to party strength in spite of Nilekani's strong campaign
• Bellary - The mining scam is most likely to affect BJP's chances here. Sushma Swaraj had opposed the inclusion of Sreeramulu in BJP. But you never know, Sreeramulu is quite a big shot in this area and could win the seat easily.
• Bijapur - This constituency will be a tough fight between Ramesh Jigajinagi of BJP vs Prakash Rathod of Congress. Though the youth in the constituency seem to want Modi at the centre, the  presence of 7  Congress MLAs could work in Rathod's favour
• Chikkballapur - Definitely a contest to watch out for. H.D.Kumaraswamy, ex-CM is expected to win comfortably against Veerappa Moily
• Dakshina Kannada - Considered a BJP/RSS stronghold, this constituency has seen a tremendous shift in demographics over the years and it could see Congress grasping power for the first time
• Davanagere - A perfect three-way contest between BJP's sitting MP Siddheshwara, Congress's Mallikarjuna and JD(S)'s Mahima Patel, son of former CM JH Patel. It will be one of the closest contests in the state and could go any way. Due to Congress's strength in the state assembly, I have predicted a win for them.
• Mandya - Actress Divya Spandana a.k.a Ramya won here in the recently held bypolls with the support of Ambareesh, but this time around without his open support, she would find it difficult to win
• Hassan - Deve Gowda's stronghold. But at 82, it needs to be seen if he still has the political clout to win here against Congress's A.Manju.

Constituency-wise predictions below

No	Constituency	Predicted Winner	Party	Other Top 2 Candidate	Party
1	BAGALKOT	Ajay Kumar Sarnaik	INC	Gaddigoudar Parvtagouda Chandanagouda	BJP
2	BANGALORE CENTRAL	P.C. Mohan	BJP	V. Bala Krishnan	AAP
3	BANGALORE NORTH	D.V. Sadananda Gowda	BJP	C.Narayana Swamy	INC
4	BANGALORE RURAL	D.K.Suresh	INC	R. Prabhakara Reddy	JD(S)
5	BANGALORE SOUTH	Ananth Kumar	BJP	Nandan Nilekani	INC
6	BELGAUM	Suresh Angadi	BJP	Lakshmi Hebbalkar	INC
7	BELLARY	N Y Hanumantappa	INC	B Sreeramulu	BJP
8	BIDAR	N.Dharam Singh	INC	Bandeppa Khashempur	JD(S)
9	BIJAPUR	Ramesh Jigajinagi	BJP	Prakash Rathod	INC
10	CHAMARAJANAGAR	A.R. Krishna Murthy	BJP	R. Dhruvanarayana	INC
11	CHIKKBALLAPUR	H D Kumara Swamy	JD(S)	M Veerappa Moily	INC
12	CHIKKODI	Ramesh Vishwanath Katti	BJP	Prakash Hukkeri	INC
13	CHITRADURGA	Janardhana Swamy	BJP	B.N.Chandrappa	INC
14	DAKSHINA KANNADA	Janardhana Poojary	INC	Nalin Kumar Katil	BJP
15	DAVANAGERE	S S Mallikarjun	INC	G.M. Siddeshwara	BJP
16	DHARWAD	Pralhad Joshi	BJP	Vinay Kulkarni	INC
17	GULBARGA	Mallikarjun Kharge	INC	Revasing Loku	BJP
18	HASSAN	H.D. Devegowda	JD(S)	Manju. A.	INC
19	HAVERI	Saleem Azeez Ahmed	INC	Udasi Shivakumar Channabasappa	BJP
20	KOLAR	K H Muniyappa	INC	Em. Narayanaswamy	BJP
21	KOPPAL	Sanganna A. Karadi	BJP	Basavaraj Hitnal	INC
22	MANDYA	C.S.Puttaraju	JD(S)	Divya Spandana	INC
23	MYSORE	Adagooru H Vishwanath	INC	Prathap Simha	BJP
24	RAICHUR	B.V.Nayak	INC	D.B.Nayak	JD(S)
25	SHIMOGA	B.S. Yeddyurappa	BJP	Geetha Shivarajkumar	JD(S)
26	TUMKUR	G.S.Basavaraj	BJP	S.P.Muddahanumegowda	INC
27	UDUPI CHIKMAGALUR	Shobha Karandlaje	BJP	Jayaprakash Hegde	INC
28	UTTARA KANNADA	Anantkumar Hegde	BJP	Deshpande Prashanth	INC

And the seats tally would be as follows

Party	Seats
BJP	14
INC	11
JD(S)	3

I would peg the maximum for BJP at 14 though.Very difficult for them to win more. Most opinion polls are predicting a minimum of 15 for Congress, which I don't see happening.