India election results 2024 live: Modi forced to form coalition after losing parliamentary majority

Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau congratulated Narendra Modi on his re-election even as a high-level Canadian parliamentary panel concluded that India was the second biggest foreign threat to Canada after China.

Despite tensions between the two countries, Mr Trudeau’s office wrote on X: “Congratulations to Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi on his electoral victory.

Canada stands ready to work with its government to advance the relationship between our nations’ peoples — anchored to human rights, diversity, and the rule of law.”

Meanwhile, the report by the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians (NSICOP), a bipartisan group of MPs and senators in Canada, emerges at a time when India-Canada relations are at an all-time low after Mr Trudeau alleged last year that Indian government agents were involved in the killing of a Khalistani activist Hardeep Singh Nijjar, a claim New Delhi dismissed as “absurd”.

After meeting with key allies yesterday, Narendra Modi is expected to receive a set of demands today from the regional parties with whom he will be formed to form a coalition.

Modi held talks with allies for hours at his official residence yesterday, after he resigned to pave way for the formation of a new government in the wake of India’s election.

The Telegu Desam Party (TDP) led by N Chandrababu Naidu is likely to demand a new special status for his state Andhra Pradesh, a cabinet role for his son and more funds for Amravati city in his state.

Indian National Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge said that the alliance of opposition parties – INDIA – will continue to fight against the “fascist rule” of the Bharatiya Janata Party.

Speaking to the media on Wednesday, he said: “The people’s mandate has given a befitting reply to the BJP and their politics of hate and corruption. This is a mandate in defence of the Constitution of India and against price rise, unemployment and crony capitalism and also to save democracy.”

On X, the INDIA bloc wrote late on Wednesday after Modi resigned from his post and held a meeting with key allies: “Game Not Over. Wait”.

Meanwhile, Mr Kharge said that the bolstered opposition will take “appropriate steps” at the “appropriate time” and added that “we will keep up with the promises we have made to the people”.

Nine out of 13 candidates who switched political parties after being investigated by federal agencies have lost their races, according to The Indian Express.

The majority of these were from the BJP or its allies.

There were over 150 such “turncoat” candidates overall, with thirteen facing active probes from the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), India’s income tax department, or enforcement directorate before they decided to switch parties.

Among the prominent losers were Jyoti Mirdha, Kripashankar Singh, Tapas Roy, Kothapalli Geeta, Preneet Kaur, and Geeta Koda — all switched to the BJP after facing various legal and investigative challenges.

Critics have accused the BJP of using such investigations to strong-arm opposition politicians into switching allegiance, an allegation the ruling party has denied.

Narendra Modi will return as India’s prime minister for a rare third term and stake his claim to form a coalition government after his allies elected him as their leader on Wednesday.

Mr Modi offered his resignation to President Droupadi Murmu to pave the way for the formation of a new government after a disappointing outing by his Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in the general election.

For the first time since the BJP swept to power in 2014, the party did not secure a majority on its own, winning 240 seats, far fewer than the record 303 it won in the 2019 election.

This means that Mr Modi will for the first time need to form a coalition government to run the world’s largest democracy with the help of regional powers, which have not been averse to shifting their loyalties in the past.

Sri Lankan president Ranil Wickremesinghe and Bangladesh prime minister Sheikh Hasina became the first foreign leaders to confirm their attendance at Narendra Modi’s swearing-in ceremony, expected to take place on Saturday.

Ms Hasina is due to visit India again later this month for a bilateral meeting.

Leaders from Bhutan, Mauritius and Nepal are also expected to attend the swearing-in ceremony, the Times of India reported.

Mr Modi is set to take the prime ministerial office for a historic third time, despite his BJP failing to secure a parliamentary majority. He will have to rely on coalition partners to form a government.

On Wednesday, he resigned from his post and held meetings with key allies at his official residence in New Delhi.

Indian citizens of the country had a choice to make this election season: back Hindu nationalist prime minister Narendra Modi for a rare third term or usher in an alternative?

Rahul Gandhi – the scion of India’s most prominent political dynasty – is often pitched as an alternative candidate.

Mr Gandhi, though he is not officially the leader, is the centre of gravity of the Congress, the primary opposition to Mr Modi’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

Arpan Rai has this report on the most prominent challenger to Mr Modi:

The opposition INDIA alliance’s better-than-expected performance came despite an increasingly hostile environment created by the Modi government, which used the agencies of state to seize the Congress party’s funds, jail some of the INDIA bloc’s best-known leaders, and create an atmosphere of threat against critical NGOs and media.

“Modi had threatened in a political rally that after 4 June, all opposition leaders will be in jail,” says Congress chief Mallikarjun Kharge.

Modi’s biggest political rival in New Delhi, Arvind Kejriwal from the Aam Aadmi Party, returned to jail on Sunday even as the exact charges against him, relating to a now-scrapped liquor policy, remain unclear.

Kejriwal’s spokesperson Akshay Marathe tells The Independent that Modi “made every attempt possible to undermine democracy in India” and the Indian opposition will now be in a position to undo that damage.

“Those who BJP ran roughshod and took for granted have hit back and humbled them.

“It is clear that Modi fatigue has set in in India,” Indian political economist and author Parakala Prabhakar tells The Independent.

“This is a decisive rejection of the divisive agenda that Modi has been canvassing for the past few months with his policies and hate speech. By claiming to capture 400 out of 543 seats, he made the minorities feel that he is out to change the Indian constitution.

“This election, the dice were loaded against the BJP. India is facing acute rural distress, steep price rises, spiking unemployment rate and, instead, Modi got carried away by the stock market, by NRIs [non-resident Indians] praising India or some western CEO’s comment on India. The opposition has to now undo this damage of 10 years,” Prabhakar says.

The mood is electric inside a packed Congress party headquarters in Delhi as activists and workers jostle to get a glimpse of Rahul Gandhi, who arrives at the podium with a red pocket-size edition of the Indian constitution in his hand.

He utilised this prop throughout the election campaign as he warned that a third straight Narendra Modi landslide would allow the Hindu nationalist BJP to rip up the country’s constitution and declare India a Hindu state.

The landslide never materialised, and Mr Modi is now set to lead a coalition government that will force him to rely on allies for his majority, a limited mandate that could have far-reaching consequences for the next five years.

My colleague Arpan Rai has this report on what Mr Modi’s underperformance could mean for the opposition alliance: