The British parliament has voted down a motion by Prime Minister Boris Johnson for the United Kingdom to hold a snap general election.
Johnson and his government were defeated on Wednesday after only 298 voted in favour of the motion and 56 against, thereby leaving 133 short of the required 434 votes.
The opposition Labour Party had directed its members to abstain from voting and majority complied with the instruction as 214 of its members did not vote.
Speaking after the vote, the Prime Minister berated Jeremy Corbyn, leader of the opposition in parliament, for instructing his party members to abstain from voting.
According to Johnson, Corbyn was “the first leader of the opposition in the democratic history of our country to refuse the invitation to an election”.
He “urged [Mr Corbyn’s] colleagues to reflect on the unsustainability of this position overnight and in the course of the next few days”.
The Prime Minister had called for a snap election to be held on October 15, two days before a European Union summit in Brussels, after the House of Commons had on Tuesday passed a bill blocking the no-deal Brexit option.
The no-deal is an option hugely favoured by Johnson to get the UK out of the EU by the stipulated date of October 31.