“STRONG OPPOSITION”
Rival China congratulated Modi earlier on Wednesday and said it was “ready to work” with its neighbour, while Japan also applauded the win.
Modi, 73, insisted on Tuesday night that the election results were a victory that ensured he would continue his agenda.
“Our third term will be one of big decisions and the country will write a new chapter of development,” Modi told a crowd of cheering supporters in the capital New Delhi after his win.
“This is Modi’s guarantee.”
Some newspapers offered a less exhilarated view.
“India cuts Modi down,” The Telegraph daily, from the opposition stronghold state of West Bengal, splashed across its front page.
“Coalition Karma,” read the headline of India’s Mint newspaper.
The BJP secured 240 seats in parliament, well down from the 303 from five years ago and 32 seats short of a majority on its own.
The main opposition Congress party won 99 seats in a remarkable turnaround, almost doubling its 2019 tally of 52.
Party president Mallikarjun Kharge said the result was a vote against Modi “and the substance and style of his politics”.
“It is a huge political loss for him personally apart from being a clear moral defeat as well,” he told party leaders at a meeting of the opposition alliance.
“The country has said to Narendra Modi ‘We don’t want you’,” opposition leader Rahul Gandhi told reporters after the results were released, saying people had given “the right response”.
Commentators and exit polls had projected an overwhelming victory for Modi, who critics have accused of leading the jailing of opposition figures and trampling on the rights of India’s 200-million-plus Muslim community.
In a personal sting, Modi was re-elected to his constituency representing the Hindu holy city of Varanasi with a far lower margin of 152,300 votes. That compared with nearly half a million votes five years ago.
