India held general elections—the largest democratic election in the world—to the 15th Lok Sabha in five phases on 16 April, 22/23 April, 30 April, 7 May and 13 May 2009. The results of the election were announced on 16 May 2009.
According to the Indian Constitution, elections in India for the Lok Sabha (the lower house) must be held at least every five years under normal circumstances. With the last elections held in 2004, the term of the 14th Lok Sabha expires on 1 June 2009. Indian elections are conducted according to the first past the post (FPTP) system, similar to that of the United Kingdom and various other Commonwealth nations.
The election was conducted by the Election Commission of India, which estimates an electorate of 714 million voters, an increase of 43 million over the 2004 election. During the budget presented in February 2009, Rs.1,120 Crores (€176 million) was budgeted for election expenses.[2]
Three Indian states—Andhra Pradesh, Orissa and Sikkim also conducted elections to their respective legislative assemblies.
Even though election turnout for all five phases were around 59.7%, India's electorate increased by 43 million from last year to 714 million voters. This electorate is larger than all 50 countries in Europe put together, all 54 countries in Africa, all 41 countries in North and South America, and the entire British Commonwealth minus India. Due to the staggering amount of people that could vote in this election, the election was set in five phases, even though many officials believe that it could have been done in one phase, if there were enough security personnel.[3]
On 16 May 2009, after poor showing in early trends that showed the Indian National Congress led United Progressive Alliance, with 250+ seats, Bharatiya Janata Party conceded defeat, and acknowledged that they could not be the single largest party or a single largest alliance.
After a surprisingly strong showing in Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal, Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Rajasthan, the UPA led by the Indian National Congress are set to form the government under the incumbent prime minister Manmohan Singh, who is the first Prime Minister of India since Jawaharlal Nehru in 1962 to win re-election after completing a full five-year term.
The result not only meant defeat of the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance, but it also brought out one of the worst performances by the Left Front, who had been hoping to form a non-Congress, non-BJP government with the Third Front. This idea was put to rest due to the unexpected losses by the AIADMK in Tamil Nadu and the TDP and other allies in Andhra Pradesh, a Congress sweep in Kerala and a big victory for Congress and its ally Trinamool Congress in West Bengal. As the final seat counts came in, it was evident that the Left Front along with the rest of the Third Front did not prove to be a competitor in this election.
Due to the surprising results, so much at odds with the polling done by all parties, questions are starting to be asked about the integrity of the electronic voting machines used during the election. This is especially the case given that what seems to be the final results for all candidates for all parties was found on the Election Commission of India's server days before final voting had even begun. These numbers disappeared the day before the final count. As of yet the official vote count for candidates has yet to be released, making it impossible to compare the numbers found before the election with the actual tallies.
The Indian National Congress was able to put together a comfortable majority of more than 322 members out of 543 with the help of its allies. This is short of 335 from last election, but due to the fact that UPA on its own was able to get over 260 seats, this government appears to be much more stable than the last government. The 322 members included both the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance, as well as external support from the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), Samajwadi Party (SP), Janata Dal (Secular), Rashtriya Janata Dal and other minor parties.
On May 22, 2009, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was sworn in as Prime Minister of India, in Asoka Hall of Rashtrapati Bhavan, after he submitted his resignation, on May 18, 2009, as previous Prime Minister to President Pratibha Patil.
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