The ruling BJP is leading — but the opposition Congress is making strides too
Though it's only midmorning in India, the Election Commission has begun sharing preliminary results online as votes are counted across the nation — with Prime Minister Narendra Modi's ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leading the count so far.
These early results "suggest that yes, the BJP is favored to win, butit's a much more competitiverace than many of thepollsters and even theexit polls had predicted," said CNN Senior International Correspondent Ivan Watson, reporting from the capital New Delhi.
"Thpreliminary results... suggest that themain opposition party, theIndian National Congress, isleading in 100 seats," Watson said.
"Ifthat trend continues, (that) wouldsuggest they could bepoised to win far more seats than they won in 2019, when thatparty was basically shellackedat the polls."
Experts caution that vote counting only began a few hours ago, and the balance could keep shifting as the day goes on.
On Monday, exit polls helped drive record gains in Indian stock markets, Watson noted.
Subir Sinha, director of the SOAS South Asia Institute, said Congress' strides were "a surprise formany people who had taken theexit polls more seriously thanthey perhaps should have."
"Thesewill not hold all the waythrough the count — but earlyindications are obviously verydifferent from the exit pollsthat came out in the last twoor three days," he told CNN's John Vause.
Victory target:A party or a coalition needs 272 parliamentary seats out of 543 to win. The leader of the party that wins a majority will become prime minister and form the government.Modi is aiming for a 400-seat supermajority, with 370 seats directly controlled by the BJP and the others from its National Democratic Alliance.
In the world's biggest election, millions of migrants were unable to vote
From CNN’s Jessie Yeung, Priti Gupta and Dhruv Tikekar
Chanu Gupta has lived in India’s financial capital Mumbai nearly his whole life, since arriving as a child from the northern state of Uttar Pradesh.
But when polls opened in the city, the 59-year-old street vendor wasn't able to vote in the nationwide election – along with millions of internal migrant workers who are a major backbone of the country’s economy.
“I cannot go vote as I don’t belong to Maharashtra state,” Gupta told CNN in Mumbai’s shopping district Dadar, standing next to the roadside cart where he sells shaved ice and cold drinks. “I have voting rights in another state.”
Under India’s election rules, eligible voters can only cast ballots in their constituencies — meaning those working outside of their state have to return home to vote.
That’s all but impossible for many out-of-state workers, especially underprivileged daily-wage workers in the unorganized sector. And it’s a huge group — one study estimates there were about 600 million internal migrants in 2020, making up 43% of the country’s nearly 1.4 billion population at the time.
These workers are often from poorer rural parts of India, in search of work in bigger cities. Even then, they earn low wages that are usually sent home to support family members.
Perhaps nowhere is this starker than Mumbai — India’s richest city and the birthplace of the Bollywood movie industry. Often referred to as the “city of dreams,” Mumbai draws migrants from across the country hoping to find wealth and success.
More than 43% of Mumbai’s population were classed as migrants in 2011 during the last national census, according to migration think tank Knomad.
Read the full story.
In pictures: The indelible ink behind India's election
From CNN's Dhruv Tikekar
India’s twice-a-decade exercise in democracy has once again left its mark on the country’s people, in the form of purple-streaked index fingers.
The Election Commission uses indelible ink to prevent fraud or duplicate votes. Once a voter arrives at the booth to cast their ballot and has their ID verified, the ink is painted across the top of their left index finger, leaving a stain that can take up to two weeks to wash off.
It may be rudimentary, but the method has been so effective that it’s been in place for more than seven decades.
“Right from the prime minister to the most common person, everybody flashes their (marked) finger,” said K Mohammed Irfan, managing director of Mysore Varnish and Paints Limited (MVPL), the state-owned company that exclusively makes and distributes the liquid to polling booths across the nation.
“From celebrities to film stars… (it has become) a mark of democracy that I think is synonymous with elections,” he told CNN in a video interview.
More than 960 million people were eligible to vote inIndia’s election, the world’s biggest. And workers at the company’s factory in Mysuru, a city in southwestern Karnataka state, have spent months preparing nearly 2.7 million inkvials, its largest order to date.
The orange containers were filled and carefully packed for distribution ahead of this year’s elections, which are underway and endJune 1. Each vial contains enough liquid to mark approximately 700 voters.
The key to the ink’s literal staying power? A tightly guarded formula which has remained unchanged since 1951. “Indelible ink serves no other purpose,” said Irfan. “We only manufacture the required quantity.”
While Irfan says the company is “bound to secrecy” when it comes to the ink’s exact composition, it does contain the chemical compound silver nitrate, which causes a purplish stain when it comes into contact with skin and is exposed to sunlight.
Read more about India's indelible ink.
Analysis: Modi and ruling BJP embraced Islamophobic rhetoric on campaign trail
Analysis from CNN'sRhea Mogul
IndianPrime MinisterNarendra Modi increasingly resorted to overtly Islamophobic language during his election campaign, critics and observers said, as he sought a third straight term governing the world’s most populous nation.
The popular leader — and overwhelming favorite — embraced negative campaigning, they said, and received little pushback from civil society or election authorities.
Followers of Modi’s Hindu-nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) — and some of its top figures — have long been accused of using inflammatory language to describe the country’s 200 million Muslims, but rarely Modi himself. But this election has brought a clear shift, critics say.
“What is unique about what we’ve seen recently, is that these statements are being uttered by the Prime Minister himself,” said Milan Vaishnav, a senior fellow and director of the South Asia Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. “Not necessarily by surrogates — the Home Minister, or by the chief minister — or by other kind of party apparatchiks.”
The shift in tone is making many Indian Muslims nervous.
“Modi and the BJP have for a long time been making references to the community, but it’s moved on from the dog whistle,” said political researcher and columnist Asim Ali. “It’s painting us as an existential threat to Hindus. It’s coming directly from the prime minister. It’s anti-Muslim, and it’s dangerous.”
Modi and his BJP have repeatedly said they do not discriminate against minority groups. But analysts and observers noted that multiple speeches he made during his campaign specifically refer to Muslims and paint them in a negative light.
Read the full analysis.
BJP wins first seat unopposed in Modi's home state
From CNN staff
The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has secured its first parliamentary seat of the 2024 election, according to the Election Commission of India, as officials across the country tally up 642 million votes.
The win is in the city of Surat, in Prime Minister Narendra Modi's home state of Gujarat, where the BJP candidate stood uncontested.
BJP in early lead: As of 9:20 a.m. local time, Modi's BJP is leading in more than 140 constituencies, according to the Election Commission's website. However, it's still very early in the count and it's unclear how many votes remain to be counted in those constituencies.
Waiting for results:It's unclear what time the full results will be known, but in the last election the general trend became clear by early afternoon. The Election Commission won’t certify numbers until every seat has been counted, a process that could take a day or longer, especially if there is a hung parliament.
Victory target:A party or a coalition needs 272 seats out of 543 to win. The leader of the party that wins a majority will become prime minister and form the government.Modi is aiming for a 400-seat supermajority, with 370 seats directly controlled by the BJP and the others from its National Democratic Alliance.
How is India counting its 642 million votes?
From CNN’s Helen Regan and Rhea Mogul
India’s national elections were a giant exercise in democracy and logistics that took six weeks to complete.
About 968 million people were eligible to vote — more than the populations of the United States, the European Union and Russia combined.And about 642 million people cast their votes in the election, according to Rajiv Kumar, the chief election commissioner of India.
Given the size of the electorate, there wasn't a single date when everyone could vote. Instead, polling unfolded over seven phases around the country, beginning on April 19 and ending on June 1.
Under a multi-party, first-past-the-post system, Indians voted to fill 543 seats in the lower house of parliament, called the Lok Sabha.
The party with the majority will form a government and appoint one of its winning candidates as prime minister.
How votes are counted: All the votes from the country’s 28 states and eight union territories will be counted and the results released today.
Counting is done simultaneously at counting stations in each of the 543 constituencies nationwide. Officials begin by counting postal ballots, only available to select groups such as government officials or those with disabilities — before moving on to votes recorded in electronic machines.
Each vote in the machine has both an electronic and paper record, with the paper slips stored in sealed boxes.
Who are the contenders in India's election?
From CNN’s Helen Regan and Rhea Mogul
Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) remain hugely popular — and he is widely expected to secure another five years in power.
The 73-year-old was first elected prime minister in 2014 with a roaring majority on a ticket of development and anti-corruption. He is credited with implementing welfare and social reforms, and easily secured a second term in 2019, this time on a more apparent platform of Hindu nationalism.
In that election more than 67% of Indians cast their ballot — the highest voter turnout in the country’s history.
The main challenger to the BJP is the Indian National Congress, which has governed the country for much of the 77 years since independence but has more recently found itself in the doldrums.
In an effort to prevent another Modi win, the Congress formed an alliance with other opposition leaders, including major regional parties. The Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance, or INDIA, launched its campaign late last month on a platform of “saving democracy.”
Political scion Rahul Gandhi is the face of the Congress party, but other key figures include the popular leader of the Aam Aadmi Party and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal.
There are also regional heavyweights such as the West Bengal chief minister and All India Trinamool Congress’ Mamata Banerjee and the south’s Tamil Nadu chief minister Muthuvel Karunanidhi Stalin, who are vying to block a BJP takeover in their respective states where Modi is yet to break through.
Vote counting begins in world's biggest election
From CNN'sRhea Mogul
Counting has begun in India after the world's biggest election — in which 642 million votes were cast over more than six weeks of polling.
The tallying of the results began at 8 a.m, local time (10:30 p.m. ET), according to the Election Commission of India.
Under a first-past-the-post system, Indians voted to fill 543 seats in the lower house of parliament, called the Lok Sabha.
Victory target: A party or a coalition needs 272 seats out of the 543 to win. The leader of the party that wins a majority will become prime minister and form the government.
What to watch for as India counts its votes
From CNN staff
After more than six weeks of polling over seven phases, countless campaign rallies spanning the country, and 642 million voters casting ballots at more than 1 million polling stations, India's marathon election will soon be over.
When results will be announced:
- Counting starts at about 8 a.m. local time (10:30 p.m. ET), when the Election Commission (EC) will start posting results on its website. It's unclear what time the full results will be known, but in 2019 the general trend became clear by early afternoon.
- The EC won’t certify numbers until every seat has been counted, a process that could take a day or longer, especially if there is a hung parliament.
- Once a clear winner is determined, India's President Draupadi Murmu will invite the winner to form a government.
- The swearing in ceremony would take place over the next week or so.
What a party needs to win:
- Under a first-past-the-post system, Indians voted to fill 543 seats in the lower house of parliament, called the Lok Sabha.
- All the votes will be counted today.
- A party or a coalition needs 272 seats out of the 543 to win.
- The leader of the party that wins a majority will become prime minister and form a ruling government.
- Prime Minister Narendra Modi is aiming for a 400-seat supermajority, with 370 directly controlled by his Bharatiya Janata Party — up from 303 in 2019 — and the others from its National Democratic Alliance.
