After Legislative Council polls on ballot paper, Modi asks Congress how many seats it won

Results of elections to 23 constituencies, including five Legislative Council seats in Maharashtra and seats in three other states, were declared today. In Maharashtra, three candidates of the BJP-led Mahayuti were elected, while the Maha Vikas Aghadi won two seats, making for a closely fought contest in the state.

The Legislative Council elections were held on ballot papers, so all eyes were on the outcome. The BJP also had an opportunity to use the win to rebut allegations about EVMs. Prime Minister Narendra Modi took a swipe at Congress in a tweet in this context.

After the BJP's big successes in the Assembly election results in some states, the opposition alleges that it was an EVM victory. In Maharashtra too, the Maha Vikas Aghadi had raised doubts about EVMs after the Assembly election results. Congress and the opposition also raise the slogan "EVM hatao, desh bachao". There is also a continuing demand that elections be held on ballot papers instead of EVMs.

Against this backdrop, after the Legislative Council results in four states, Modi targeted Congress on Twitter. He asked Congress to guess how many seats it won, when the Legislative Council elections for 28 seats in the four large states of Maharashtra, Karnataka, Uttar Pradesh and Bihar were held with voting on ballot papers. The BJP's official Twitter handle also raised the same question and criticised Congress.

Meanwhile, the figures are coming in. According to the numbers available so far, the NDA leads on 15 seats. Congress has yet to win a single seat, the picture suggests. In Maharashtra, however, the Maha Vikas Aghadi won two seats on the Nationalist Congress Party symbol.

In Bihar, on the other hand, the BJP suffered a setback. Four sitting MLAs, including sitting MLA Naval Kishore Yadav, were defeated. The Jan Suraaj Party opened its account from the Darbhanga teachers' constituency.

In Uttar Pradesh, the BJP suffered a major blow in Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Varanasi constituency. The BJP lost the teachers' Legislative Council seat. In the previous election, the Samajwadi Party had defeated the BJP and won both seats, and this time the Samajwadi Party retained its candidates. On the teachers' seat, the Samajwadi Party's Lal Bihari Yadav defeated the BJP's Pramod Kumar Mishra by more than 4,000 first-preference votes.