BANDA: With half of polling for Lok Sabha elections over in the country, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said on Thursday that the leaders of the opposition parties have a long face as they know they will get 'zero battey sannata'. "Opposition leaders have a long face after half of polling is over as they know the outcome," he said at a public meeting here in the Bundelkhand region of Uttar Pradesh.

Hitting back at the opposition for their strident criticism of his government, Modi said, "In the first half of campaigning, the opposition kept abusing Modi, but it did not materialise."

"So, now in the remaining half, the opposition will keep abusing the EVMs," he said.

His remarks came in the backdrop of Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav complaining that EVMs were malfunctioning across the country during the third phase of polling on April 23.

"The opposition will get 'zero battey sannata'," he said, playing on the name of a Hindi comic movie 'Nil Battey Sannata', which means zero divided by zero equals nothing, a slang for good for nothing.

Meanwhile, Modi will hold a road show on Thursday in his parliamentary constituency Varanasi. He will file his nomination papers on Friday. The road show will cover Assi Ghat, Bhadaini, Sonarpura, Madanpura, Jangambadi, Godowlia before concluding at the Dashashwamedh Ghat.

Upon his arrival on Thursday afternoon, Modi will pay a floral tribute to the statue of Pandit Madan Mohan Malviya in the city's Lanka before kicking off the road show

Modi won the seat in 2014 by defeating Aam Aadmi Party national convenor Arvind Kejriwal and Ajay Rai of the Congress.

Varanasi goes to the polls on May 19 in the seventh phase of the Lok Sabha elections.