Bharatiya Janata Party-Shiromani Akali Dal (BJP-SAD) combine candidate Manjinder Singh Sirsa swept west Delhi's Rajouri Garden by poll with close to 15,000 votes here on Thursday.
Mr. Sirsa, who was maintaining a lead over his rivals from the Congress and the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) since the first round of counting began earlier today, registered a win by over them by 14652 votes.
This even as the Congress, whose candidate Meenakshi Chandela came in second, termed the result "a revival of the Congress". AAP's Harjeet Singh finishing a distant third was interpreted as a lesson by the AAP.
The final tally of votes stood at 40602 votes for the BJP-SAD, 25950 votes for the Congress, 10243 for the AAP and 641 votes polled under the None of the Above (NOTA) category.
"This result reflects that the AAP has been exposed through its deeds in front of the people of Delhi. It is time that Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal resigns to honour actual public sentiment against him and his government and paves the way for fresh elections to the Delhi Assembly," Mr Sirsa said.
Leader of Opposition in the Delhi Assembmy and senior BJP leader Vijender Gupta said the result reflected that the people had decided now decided to reject the AAP after dealing a similar blow to the Congress.
Delhi Congress vice-president Chattar Singh said that the result showed that the party was on its way to revival.
"Our vote share has increased from 9 per cent to 38 per cent. While our votes have returned to us, the AAP's vote share has fallen. People have rejected the so-called politics of change of the AAP," he said.
Deputy Delhi Chief Minister Manish Sisodia said the result showed that the people of the constituency were upset over former AAP MLA Jarnail Singh choosing to resign to contest the Punjab Assembly polls.
"There was a lot of anger among the people of Rajouri Garden because their MLA left the seat. We tried our best to assure people that we will continue his work, but the results show that they were not convinced," Mr. Sisodia said.
He also said that they will continue to work for the constituency.
Mr. Sisodia also rubbished speculations that this result will affect the mood of the voters before the upcoming municipal polls.
"This was a by-poll and several times in the past it has happened that BJP has won there but fared poorly in local elections. We are confident that Delhi government's work in the last two years will be a benchmark for people to judge us by," he said.
