NEW DELHI — Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, flashing a V-for-victory sign, voted in his district Wednesday in parliamentary elections as early exit polls predicted he would be returned to office for another five years with perhaps a less stable government.

The five-phase elections that began April 20 will end Monday, with ballot-counting to start May 13. Early polls by independent television stations in seven states voting Wednesday in the fourth round indicated Vajpayee's coalition of a dozen parties may fall short of winning a majority of Parliament seats.

In that case, his National Democratic Alliance would have to draw more small parties into the coalition, making it more likely to fray.

Vajpayee's coalition was strongly favored ahead of the start of the three-week elections on the strength of a booming economy and peace overtures with rival Pakistan. But opinion and exit polls have since shown his coalition losing seats overall.

Early exit polls on Wednesday by independent Star News and Aaj Tak television — based on a half-day of voting and the previous three phases — showed that trend continuing.

Star News projected Vajpayee's coalition getting 270-282 of Parliament's 543 elected seats, with 167-179 for Congress and 87-89 for smaller parties.

Aaj Tak projected 266 votes for Vajpayee's coalition and 175 for Congress and its allies, with smaller parties getting 102.

"I am not nervous" about exit polls, Vajpayee said before voting in Lucknow, capital of Uttar Pradesh state.

He later displayed the ink on his finger that proved he had voted and flashed a V-for-victory sign.

However, the general secretary of his Bharatiya Janata Party, Pramod Mahajan, acknowledged the governing coalition might not win enough seats to form a majority government.

"We could take help from smaller political parties in case we fall short (by) a couple of seats," Press Trust of India quoted Mahajan as saying.

Half of the 107 million eligible voters participated in the election in some of the country's most violent regions Wednesday, and three deaths were reported. A man was killed in a grenade explosion in Jammu-Kashmir and two men were shot dead in gunfights between political party supporters outside polling stations in eastern Bihar state.

Election violence has killed 39 people and wounded more than 330 since April 19, In 1999 elections, about 100 people died.

Vajpayee, 79, was opposed in Lucknow by an old friend and former member of his Cabinet, Ram Jethmalani, 80, who questioned the prime minister's mental and physical fitness to lead this nation of 1 billion, and objected to the pro-Hindu agenda of Vajpayee's party.

The main opposition Congress party led by Italian-born Sonia Gandhi argues that the government's prosperity drive has been limited to cities and has not touched the lives of people in villages, where most Indians live.

More than 270,000 soldiers were deployed to guard voting booths in the states of Arunachal Pradesh, Bihar, Jammu-Kashmir, Madhya Pradesh, Nagaland, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh.

There were demonstrations Wednesday throughout the district that voted in Jammu-Kashmir, where Muslim separatists called for a poll boycott and threatened to kill anyone participating in the elections.

A grenade thrown onto a street in Anantnag, the main town, killed a bystander and wounded four, police said.

Hours before polls opened, suspected Islamic separatists hurled grenades at two polling stations, wounding three election officials and six security guards, police said.

More than 65,000 people have been killed in the 14 years of fighting between Islamic militants and Indian forces.