The counting is underway in India after the country's mammoth elections, which concluded on Saturday. Ballet boxes and electronic voting machines have been opened at heavily guarded polling stations. Results should come in later today. The Indian Election Commission says a record 642 million people voted. Early results show that Prime Minister Narendra Modi's BJP Party has taken a lead. Samir Hussain has this report.

Cruising into this election, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, fueled by adulation and Hindu-centric ideology. His main opponent, Rahu Gandhi. The heir of a political dynasty, leader of Indian National Congress. Before the elections kicked off, their bank accounts were frozen by the government.

This is not freezing of the Congress Party's bank accounts. This is the freezing of Indian democracy.

Congress built a coalition with dozens of other political parties to counter Mr. Modi. They say the Prime Minister used intimidation to prevent a fair campaign. Politicians were raided, chief ministers jailed. Initially, the Modi campaign was all about promoting his accomplishments, but quickly turned to Islamophobic messaging. Here, Mr. Modi, telling supporters supporters, If the opposition wins, they will redistribute your wealth and give it to Muslims first.

They reject claims they're Islamophobic, but divisive politics plays to his base.

This by the Prime Minister of a secular country and the world's largest democracy.

And Samira joins us live now from Delhi. Hello, Samira.

Hi there. Look, we came into these elections expecting a resounding victory for Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his BJP Party. But if you look now at the results, we're seeing that it's actually a little bit more of a fight. We see that the BJP-led coalition or that alliance, they're leading by 292 seats. Now, they are leaning in that direction for those seats, by no means an official tally. And when you look at the India Alliance, that's the alliance made up of the Congress Party and other political parties, they are running at about 209 seats. Now, to parse out some of that, I'm joined now by Ajay Bhaas. He is a political commentator and has written many books about Indian politics Thank you for coming. I want to start by asking you, how would you characterize these elections?

Well, I think if the leads hold, because we still don't have most of the results yet, it's a huge, huge victory for an opposition which everybody thought would be wiped out. It is, I think, a blow to Mr. Modi, personally, because the BJP itself is still well below a majority. And of course, with its allies, it can, I think, comfortably form a government. But the BJP, everybody had expected, the main exit quotes had said that it would just wipe out the opposition, and it would get even a bigger victory than last time, which was huge. So I think it's quite amazing that Indian democracy is still alive. We're not looking at a one-party dictatorship. And so I think it's good for India overall.

What I want to know is what happened on the campaign trail. We saw that Mr. Modi went from campaigning on his accomplishment punishments over the last several years, but then there was a significant shift in tone, and we started hearing more divisive language and some hate speech. Why that change?

Well, I think this is not the first time, mind you, that he and other BJP leaders have used divisive language. But during national elections, he usually stays away from this. This time, after the first few phases, I think there was a feeling in the BJP that the news wasn't good, particularly from Uttar Pradek, which is the largest state in India, with really about 25% of the seats. I think that that caused him to get his Hindu core base to mobilize them But it doesn't seem to have worked that well, judging from the leads in Uttar Pradesh.

Now, given all of that, given what we're seeing in terms of the results, there have also been accusations of democratic backsliding, some institutions being attacked. And I'm wondering, given what we're seeing in terms of the trends of the election, what does that mean for a potential Modi-led government?

Well, it's too early to say. I mean, I can almost certainly say it will be a BJP government. I don't know it will be a Modi-led government. As I said, Mr. Modi was on a pedestal. Coming down from that pedestal is going to be difficult for him. But certainly, It will be a more chasened BJP when it comes back to power. I don't think that we shall see the assault on institutions which we saw before, which I think they were led to do, getting a second successive term with even an enhanced majority. I think any diminishing of that electoral majority for the BJP itself is going to, I think, make a difference.

This has certainly turned out to be a much more exciting election, especially given what we were thinking as we were coming into these elections and what we're seeing now in terms of those results.

Samira Hussain, thank you very much indeed. Thank you. If you'd like more on this story, do head to the BBC's news website. There is a live page running right now with all the latest updates and results as they're coming in. So head to the website, or of course, you can download the BBC News app and you can see some of those images which are updated minute by minute in some cases.