Consensus or division? How Modi will manage Indian coalition government

In decades of political leadership at the state and national level, Narendra Modi has never had to engage in consensus politics. Photograph: Ludovic Marin/AFP/Getty Images

As Narendra Modi traversed the country during recent months, campaigning for a third term in power, he repeated the same refrain. The past decade “was just a trailer”, the prime minister told crowds, adding: “There is plenty more to come.”

The expectation, among his Bharatiya Janata party (BJP) and most analysts and pollsters, was that India’s election would easily return him to power with the same – if not stronger – supermajority that he has enjoyed over the past decade.