With the first phase of voting for the Lok Sabha elections already begun today Friday, let us look at the big faces in the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led NDA versus the opposition's INDIA bloc.

The Coimbatore Lok Sabha seat in Tamil Nadu will witness a high-stakes battle, with State BJP president K Annamalai facing DMK leader Ganapathy P Rajkumar and All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam's (AIADMK) Singai Ramachandran.

The candidature of its Tamil Nadu state president shows that the BJP is pressing hard to increase its presence in South India.

Annamalai faces strong competition from parties like DMK and AIADMK, which hold prominent significance in Tamil Nadu with their dedicated followers.

Union Minister of Road Transport and Highways, Nitin Gadkari, will be eyeing a third straight victory from Maharashtra's Nagpur parliamentary seat. The seat will witness the contest between senior BJP leader Nitin Gadkari and Congress candidate Vikas Thakre, who is currently the Nagpur West MLA.

Jitin Prasada, who quit Congress in 2021, is one of the prominent faces of the first phase of the Lok Sabha elections as he replaced two-time MP from Pilibhit, Varun Gandhi.

The BJP has demonstrated a solid majority in UP in the previous two Lok Sabha elections, gaining the majority of seats.

In the 2024 election, the BJP has left the Gaya (reserved) seat for its ally, the Hindustani Awam Morcha-Secular (HAM-S). Jitan Ram Manjhi and former minister and RJD candidate Kumar Sarvjeet are in the electoral fray. The seat was earlier represented in parliament by Vijay Kumar, alias Vijay Manjhi of JD (U).

Meanwhile, in Madhya Pradesh's Chhindwara, the BJP is leaving no stone unturned to snatch the lone seat won by the Congress in the 2019 elections.

Similarly, the Jorhat seat in Assam will decide if the Congress' deputy leader in Lok Sabha, Gaurav Gogoi, can make it to the elected house this time too. The constituency has been seen as a stronghold of the BJP.