Historic Vote Counting Commences for Lok Sabha and State Assemblies

Vote counting for the Lok Sabha elections started across India, with 542 seats in contention. Parallel vote counting is ongoing for the Andhra Pradesh and Odisha assembly polls. The process involves postal ballots and EVMs, with added transparency through VVPAT slips.

Counting of votes for the Lok Sabha elections commenced on Tuesday morning across various states and Union Territories.

The Lok Sabha has 543 members, but counting is being conducted for 542 seats after BJP's Mukesh Dalal from Surat was elected unopposed.

Simultaneously, vote counting for the assembly elections in Andhra Pradesh and Odisha is also underway. These elections were held alongside the Lok Sabha polls. Additionally, Arunachal Pradesh and Sikkim assembly elections were conducted simultaneously, with results already declared on June 2.

According to the Conduct of Election Rules, the counting of postal ballots precedes the counting of votes recorded in electronic voting machines (EVMs), which begins 30 minutes later. Both processes will continue simultaneously.

Since 2019, VVPAT (voter verifiable paper audit trail) slips from five randomly selected polling stations per assembly constituency -- or Lok Sabha segment -- are matched with the EVM count for enhanced transparency.