Nitish Kumar led Grand Alliance has now taken the lead and was leading in 115 seats while the Narendra Modi led NDA in 93 seats.
The JDU-led alliance, which started very slow now appears to be catching up with their rivals. These are very early trends and the picture could still change considerably as more rounds of EVM counting happen.
Election Commission officials said the BJP and its allies were ahead in 90 of the 243 constituencies and the Janata Dal-United (JD-U) combine was ahead in84 seats where early trends were available.
BJP was leading in 61, JDU in 57 and the RJD in 48 seats. The Congress was leading on 10 seats.
Ram Vilas Paswan’s LJP was leading in 8 seats, Jitan Ram Majnhi’s HAM in 6 and Kushwaha’s RLSP in 6.
Counting of the millions of votes polled in the five-phase assembly polls began on Sunday, with officials first taking up the postal ballot.
The staggered election to the 243-seat assembly started on October 12 and concluded on November 5.
The BJP contested 160 seats and its allies the LJP 40, the Rashtriya Lok Samata Party (RLSP) 23 and the HAM 20 seats.
In the Grand Alliance, the JD-U and the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) fielded 101 candidates each, while the Congress contested 41 seats.
Bihar Additional Chief Electoral Officer R. Lakshmanan said the first result was expected after 11 a.m.