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Sweets, crackers: BJP celebrates ‘moral victory’ in GHMC election
Celebration started on Friday evening as counting was still on as the party was expecting a massive surprise in the numbers.
With the counting of votes in Greater Hyderabad Municipal Council elections reaching its last leg on Friday, the BJP started celebrating what it called its ‘moral victory’ in a so far uncharted region. In 2016 civic elections, BJP had won four seats. The number in 2020 went to 48, four seats more than local party AIMIM. “Today’s results indicate that we have blessings of the people in our efforts to bring BJP govt in Telangana in 2023 elections. TRS has failed, people are against their dynasty rule & corruption. People have paved a way for a BJP govt in Telangana, in the days to come,” minister of state, home, G Kishan Reddy said as he started distributing sweets amid the counting.
BJP supporters too started bursting crackers in Hyderabad as the results were being declared.
Like the high-octane campaign ahead of the election, BJP’s reaction to the result also stood out as top prty leaders including Amit Shah, JP Nadda congratulated the victory.
“Historic result for BJP in Hyderabad GHMC elections shows that people of the country supports only & only development agenda. This result reflects people’s unequivocal support to Hon PM Shri @narendramodi ji’s development & governance model,” the BJP chief tweeted.
BJP general secretary Bhupender Yadav termed BJP’s result — second in the race as it was ahead of AIMIM during counting — as “moral victory”.
The BJP’s performance has confirmed the trend that it is replacing the Congress as the main challenger to the TRS, Yadav said. The party had won four seats in the state in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls and then its victory in the Assembly bypoll in Dubbaka came as a surprise.
“The results are very encouraging and a moral booster for the BJP, and in a way, it is a moral victory of the party. The results reaffirms that Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s leadership and his model of good governance has acceptability across regions,” Yadav, who was deputed as in-charge for the local elections in Hyderabad, told PTI.
While the TRS fielded candidates in all 150 wards in the election, the BJP put up nominees in 149. The Congress, AIMIM and the TDP fielded candidates in 146, 51 and 106 wards respectively. The TRS won 55 seats and the Congress won only two seats.
