NEW DELHI: After a long-drawn election process that was held in India from 19 April to 1 June 2024 in seven phases, to elect all 543 members of the Lok Sabha, the final results are out and it is clear that Narendra Modi will return to the helm as the Prime Minister for a record third term but this time it will not be an exclusive Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) but it will be the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government. 

 At the final count, the NDA has secured a majority by winning 292 seats while the Congress-led Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) bloc registered wins on 234 seats and has emerged as a strong opposition. 

With a total seat of 240 which was 63 less than 303 seats that it had won in 2019, the BJP could retain only 208 losing 92, but winning 32 new seats. Its second largest allies in the NDA are the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) which won 16 seats and the Janata Dal (United) JD(U) which won 12 seats. With 7 seats the Shiv Sena led by Chief Minister Eknath Shinde is among the top constituents of the NDA that has formed the government followed by others including Lok Janshakti Party (Ram Vilas) with 5 seats.

In the INDIA bloc the Congress-led with a win of 99 followed by the Samajwadi Party(SP) which won 37 seats, the All India Trinamool Congress (AITC) which won 29 seats, the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) with 22 wins, Shiv Sena (Uddhav Balasaheb Thackrey) (SHSUBT) with 9 wins, Nationalist Congress Party (Sharadchandra Pawar) (NCPSP) winning 8 and Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) winning 4 seats and others including CPI(M) with 4 seats and Aam Aadmi Party with 3 winning seats.

As the final numbers came in and it became clear that the BJP as the single largest party and the collective INDIA bloc were short of numbers to form the government the two biggest NDA allies, TDP and JD(U) reiterated their absolute support to the alliance and after several rounds of meetings between the various bloc members Narendra Modi unanimously emerged as the prime minister contender. He will now confirm the support of 293 MPs to the President of India, Droupadi Murmu, and will stake claim to form the government.