Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has won a third term, but voters drastically clipped his wings by handing his alliance a narrower margin than predicted.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has declared an election victory, as his coalition won more than half of parliamentary seats, with votes still being counted.
That sets Modi on course to win a third consecutive term — the country’s first prime minister to do so in more than 60 years.
This comes after a six-week-long election, where nearly 1 billion people were eligible to vote.
The National Democratic Alliance «is going to form the government for the third time, we are grateful to the people,» Modi said in a speech at the headquarters of his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in New Delhi. «This is a victory for the world’s largest democracy.»
But the BJP’s celebrations seem relatively muted.
Modi’s alliance had set a bullish target to win 400 out of 543 parliamentary seats. As of 9 p.m. local time, it is leading with 288 seats, according to India’s election commission. The INDIA coalition of opposition parties picked up 233 seats, defying exit polls that predicted a much lower tally.
On Tuesday morning, only a small group of supporters had gathered at BJP headquarters in New Delhi as initial trends showed the alliance would not get a landslide victory. While one loudly sang hymns to a cut-out of Prime Minister Modi in front of TV cameras, the mood was relatively somber.
At the opposition Congress party office, supporters were cheering and dancing.
