With voting on 49 seats concluding in the fifth phase, polling in 369 out of 543 constituencies ended on May 20. Voting is now left in 115 seats in the remaining two phases before the most-anticipated election verdict is announced on June 4.
This election began as a referendum on Prime Minister Narendra Modi with the BJP confident of securing an overwhelming majority aiming for 400 seats. However, with five phases of voting now behind us, the ground reality seems to be shifting.
What are the decisive factors on the ground? How has the Opposition’s performance been? Is the mandate slipping away from Narendra Modi?
On The India Story: Road to 2024, election analyst Sanjay Kumar tells editorji’s Vikram Chandra that BJP's path to ‘400 paar’ is becoming increasingly challenging. Instead, the party's immediate battle has now turned to securing the majority mark of 272 seats.