By Sanjoy Majumder BBC News online correspondent in Mangalore

Sister Matilda of Mangalore's Rosario church is worried.

She has been standing in line to vote since 0630 but an hour and a half later she has still to cast her vote.

Christians, though small in numbers, are a visible presence

The electronic voting machine has broken down and officials are making frantic calls to try and get it started.

"At this rate I'll miss my service," she says, looking at her watch.

Mangalore is on India's south-west coast, in the state of Karnataka, sandwiched between Kerala and Goa.

Christians, though small in number, have a visible presence here with numerous churches, schools and seminaries dotting the lush green landscape.

Christianity arrived in India from these shores, with the arrival of the first missionaries some 400 years ago.

Nuns and priests are among the first to line up outside polling stations in Mangalore.

Hardline

India's ruling BJP is locked in a straight fight with the opposition Congress party here.

While there is widespread support for Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee, many here are nervous of some of his party's more hardline members.

Karnataka was among the states where hardline Hindus smashed and desecrated churches a few years ago.

I am voting for the freedom of religion and for the right of individuals to practice their faith Sister Magdalene

Others remember the murder of Australian missionary Graham Staines and his two young sons by a Hindu mob in the late 1990s.

"I am voting for the freedom of religion and for the right of individuals to practice their faith," says Sister Magdalene.

Brother Austin Fernandes is studying to become a priest at Mangalore's St Joseph seminary.

He feels that the government has its priorities wrong.

"I am looking for a better government that can serve the people - poverty should be abolished and there should be no discrimination based on religion, caste and creed. The government should treat everyone as equals," he says.

Spice trade

About an hour's drive from Mangalore is the village of Elyar, near the foot of the Western Ghat mountain range.

Many of the villagers in Elyar are Muslim

Coconut trees dot the landscape amid rice fields and banana plantations.

But the real income comes from the lucrative spice trade with cinnamon, cardamom, aniseed and cashews grown here.

Many of the villagers are Muslim - like Christianity, Islam first entered India through the south-west, with Arabian traders setting foot here more than 1,000 years ago.

Many Muslim women, veiled in black, line up to vote - women outnumber men in this region.

They lift their veils for a woman polling official, also Muslim, to check their faces against the voter cards.

KP Muhammad Qasim is a local spice trader and has been voting for the past 42 years.