BJP leads Lok Sabha polls, needs Allies for majority | Fusion - WeRIndia

The Election Commission of India has announced results for 542 out of 543 Lok Sabha constituencies. The BJP secured 240 seats, while the Congress won 99 seats.

The Lok Sabha has 543 members, but counting was conducted for 542 seats as BJP’s Mukesh Dalal was elected unopposed in Surat.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi is set to form the government for a third consecutive term. Despite significant losses in three Hindi heartland states, the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) secured a majority in the Lok Sabha.

The BJP won 240 seats, falling short of the 272-seat majority mark. This is a substantial decline from the 303 seats won in 2019 and 282 seats in 2014.

To form the government, the BJP will need support from allies within the NDA. Key allies include N Chandrababu Naidu’s Telugu Desam Party, which won 16 seats in Andhra Pradesh, and Nitish Kumar’s JD(U), which secured 12 seats in Bihar.

With support from these and other alliance partners, the NDA crossed the halfway mark needed for a majority.

The Congress, part of the opposition INDIA bloc, improved its tally to 99 seats from 52 in 2019.

This gain came at the expense of the BJP in states like Rajasthan and Haryana. In Uttar Pradesh, the Samajwadi Party bolstered the INDIA bloc’s position with 37 seats.

The Trinamool Congress, another key member of the opposition alliance, increased its tally in West Bengal from 22 seats in 2019 to 29 seats. Conversely, the BJP’s count in West Bengal dropped from 18 seats in the last Lok Sabha elections to 12 seats this time.

The election results did not produce the landslide victory the BJP-led NDA had anticipated, nor what the exit polls had projected.

Over 640 million votes were counted in this massive democratic exercise, conducted in seven phases from April 19 to June 1.

The BJP’s reliance on its allies underscores the competitive nature of this election and reflects the dynamic political landscape of India.

The collaboration within the NDA will be crucial for the formation of the new government, highlighting the importance of coalition politics in India’s democracy.

Image Credit: Narendra Modi, CC BY 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Source: YouTube at 0:28 min

Image Reference: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Inside_Indian_Parliament.jpg