Smriti Irani leads Rahul Gandhi in Amethi; Twitter goes berserk!

Pic/ Twitter

The BJP appeared set for a resounding comeback on Thursday with leads in 269 seats while the Congress trailed far behind with 51, according to trends available with the Election Commission for 495 of 542 Lok Sabha seats. As votes for the seven-phase parliamentary polls were counted on Thursday, the DMK was ahead in 20 seats, the Janata Dal-United in 15, the Trinamool Congress in 20 and the Bahujan Samaj Party in 12 and its ally Samajwadi Party in eight seats, according to the poll panel.

Most television channels displayed that the BJP is way ahead of the Indian National Congress 320 seats. As the trends came in, pointing to another tenure of Narendra Modi as prime minister, there were reports of celebrations in the BJP's party offices across the country. The trends of the ruling party's leads were in sync with the exit polls, most of which predicted that the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) would be on course to retain power for a second term.

However, Amethi which is a stronghold of the Indian National Congress saw Smriti Irani leading against the Congress President Rahul Gandhi. The counting of votes was put on hold due to technical glitches. Users on Twitter could not keep shut and had plenty to say as Gandhi trails behind Smriti Irani. People went on to share memes and jokes on the same on social networking website Twitter.

Amethi is one of the keenly watched constituencies. Varanasi from where Prime Minister Modi is seeking re-election and Amethi represented by Congress president Rahul Gandhi since 2004 are being monitored. Rahul is also contesting from Wayanad in Kerala. His mother Sonia Gandhi is seeking another term from Raebareli.

In 2014, the BJP won 282 seats, leaving the Congress with an all-time low of 44 seats against the 206 it won in 2009. The counting exercise is on in over 4,000 counting centres amid concerns raised by opposition parties over alleged tampering of EVMs.

For all the live updates and stats on Lok Sabha Election Result 2019 click here

Catch up on all the latest Crime, National, International and Hatke news here. Also download the new mid-day Android and iOS apps to get latest updates