Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party-led alliance is projected to win a majority in the general election, an exit poll summary by the NDTV news channel said.
The summary of two exit polls projected the ruling National Democratic Alliance (NDA) could win more than 350 seats in the 543-member lower house of parliament, where 272 is needed for a simple majority.
The NDA won 353 in the 2019 election.
The opposition INDIA alliance led by the Congress party was predicted to win more than 120 seats.
Exit polls have a patchy record in India as they have often got election outcomes wrong, with analysts saying it is a challenge to get them right in the large and diverse country.
Nearly one billion people were eligible to vote in the seven-phase election that began on April 19 and was held in scorching summer heat in many parts.
The Election Commission will count votes polled in electronic voting machines on June 4 and results are expected the same day.
A victory for Modi, 73, will make him only the second prime minister after independence leader Jawaharlal Nehru to win three consecutive terms.
Five people have died and more than 80 are missing after a ferry caught fire off Palawan island in the western Philippines on Wednesday night, the Philippine Coast Guard said on Thursday.
The US military said on Wednesday three people have been killed in a strike on a vessel in the Caribbean Sea, the latest in a series of attacks that Washington says target "narco-terrorists" but human rights groups condemn as extrajudicial killings.
At least 14 people were killed and 11 wounded on Wednesday in an explosion at a temporary site used to store weapons and remnants of war near the Syrian city of Sarmada in Idlib province, state television reported.
The United States has destroyed five Iranian oil carriers on Tuesday after the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) targeted its navy warship with ballistic missiles "twice over the past two days".
Britain's NATS air traffic control provider has a week to investigate the systems failure that halted flights and stranded hundreds of thousands of passengers, the government said, as pressure mounts on its chief executive.
Serbia's President Aleksandar Vucic on Wednesday dissolved parliament and announced snap elections for next month as he seeks to extend his hold on power by running for prime minister.
Norway's King Harald Vwas being laid to rest on Wednesday, in a series of ceremonies marking the culmination of 13 days of national mourning following his death at the age of 89.
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