Counting of votes begins, Results expected by mid day

A party or combine needs 272 seats in the 545-member Lok Sabha to form a government.

A little over half of the 71.377 crore registered voters cast their ballots through Electronic Voting Machines in the elections that began on 16th April and ended on 13th May.

In all, 8,070 candidates, including from 46 national, and state parties, contested in the elections to 543 LS seats (two members are nominated from Anglo-Indian community).

Chief Election Commissioner Navin Chawla and Election Commissioners S Y Quraishi and V S Sampath reviewed the preparations for counting in all states and union territories through a video conference with Chief Electoral Officers.