Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi looked on course Thursday for a major victory in the world's largest election, with early trends suggesting an even bigger win for his Hindu nationalist party than in 2014.
After four hours of counting the 600 million votes cast, Election Commission data showed Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) clearly in the lead in 292 seats out of 542 with main rivals Congress on just 49.
This would push the BJP over the 272 seats needed for a majority, defying some predictions and surpassing 2014 when Modi swept to power with 282 seats, the first parliamentary majority for a single party in 30 years in the country of 1.3 billion people.
The result would give the BJP and its allies, on course for close to 50 seats, a commanding 340 seats in the lower house. They will still lack a majority in the upper house, however, putting a brake on Modi's legislative agenda.
As small BJP celebrations began in some places, Indian stocks rose, with the main stock indices, the Sensex and the Nifty gaining more than two percent to break the 40,000 and 12,000 point marks respectively for the first time.
"Time for transformation of India. Time for deep reform. I dream of us as a global superpower in my lifetime," tweeted India's richest banker, Uday Kotak, as he congratulated Modi