Wednesday Briefing

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, whose party did not win an outright majority.Credit…Atul Loke for The New York Times

Modi won, but his party suffered losses

Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India claimed a third term in office yesterday. But his party won by a far narrower margin than expected, and the aura of invincibility around Modi has been shattered.

His Bharatiya Janata Party still won the most parliamentary seats, but it lost dozens of them and was left without enough for an outright majority. So the B.J.P. will need smaller parties in its coalition to form a government, a surprising setback.

See results and takeaways.

The Indian National Congress, the main opposition, did better than expected. The party had been seen by many as irrevocably weakened after big losses in the previous two elections. The Congress and its allies increased their margin against Modi by tapping into issues like unemployment, social justice and the prime minister’s ties to India’s billionaires.

Context: Modi will be only the second Indian leader to start a third straight term, after Jawaharlal Nehru, the first prime minister. Modi called the third term “a historical feat in India’s history.”

Economy: As the election results became clearer, India’s stock markets plunged. By the end of trading yesterday, the markets were down 6 percent, nearly wiping out the year’s gains.