“Western music and vulgarity in the name of culture will be banned,” declared a party leader at a press conference in this largely agricultural state.

“On October 13, states of Haryana, Maharashtra and Arunachal Pradesh will go to polls, giving political parties a chance to attract voters with their manifestos and a catalogue of promises. But instead of offering more jobs, better infrastructure and subsidised rations, parties will now be appealing to the voters' cultural and ethnic identities,” wrote the India correspondent of Singapore newspaper Straits Times, P. Jayaram, in his blog.