Exit polls project a Modi(fied) India

With most exit polls on Monday predicting between 260 and 270 seats for the National Democratic Alliance (NDA), headed by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Narendra Modi seems all set to become India?s next prime minister.

If the BJP gets between 220 and 230 seats in the 543-seat Lok Sabha, as most polls predict, it will be the biggest mandate won by a single party since Rajiv Gandhi?s landslide victory in 1984.

While CNN-IBN has projected between 270 and 282 seats for the NDA, Times Now has given it 249 seats while ITG-Cicero for Headlines Today has forecast between 261 and 283 seats.

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The AIADMK, a potential ally for the NDA, is projected to get 22-28 seats while Trinamool Congress could get 25-31 seats in West Bengal.

The CNN-IBN poll suggests Congress got it horribly wrong in Telangana-Seemandhra. The biggest beneficiary will be the TRS, projected to get 8-12 seats in Telangana, while the Congress will get between 3 and 5. In Seemandhra, the TDP-BJP and the YSR Congress are projected to get between 11 and 15 seats each, while the Congress will get none.

According to the CNN-IBN-CSDS poll, the BJP?s vote share has gone up 15.2 percentage points to 34% of the total votes polled while that of the NDA has risen to 40.5% ? the vote for the UPA, meanwhile, has fallen from 32.8% in 2009 to 25.5% this time around. The 8 percentage point increase in turnout levels across the country ? from 58.2% in 2009 to 66.4% in 2014 ? has resulted in an 80-100-seat jump for the BJP.

In the key states of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, the polls suggest Modi delivered 65-70 extra seats for the alliance, critical for the BJP to come to power.

If the BJP manages 50 seats in UP, as several of the exit polls predict, this means an additional 40 seats in the state. In the case of Bihar, despite the re-emergence of Lalu Prasad, CNN projects the BJP will gain 10-12 seats, primarily at the expense of former ally Nitish Kumar.

Elections to the 16th Lok Sabha concluded on Monday with the last phase of polling, for 41 seats across West Bengal, Bihar and Uttar Pradesh, going off by and large peacefully.