Saudi Gazette report NEW DELHI – India's ruling Congress party suffered an electoral humiliation on Sunday at the hands of the main opposition and an anti-corruption movement, in the last major test before next year's national polls. Congress, in power at national level for a decade, lost control of all four state assemblies up for grabs in Sunday's vote count, including in New Delhi where it was set to come a distant third. Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi said that Arvind Kejriwal's Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) performed well in Delhi because they included people which the regular parties wouldn't have. “We will learn from them and do a better job in a way you can't even imagine,” he told reporters in New Delhi. Sheila Dikshit, chief minister of the capital for the last 15 years, acknowledged Congress had been toppled after only half a dozen of the 70 seats in Delhi had been declared. “We accept our defeat and we will analyze what went wrong,” said Dikshit, one of the country's most powerful politicians. While the outcome is a boost for the main opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), analysts said the stunning support for an anti-graft party in the Delhi contest signalled a wider anger with mainstream politics. According to results and trends, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) had got 32 seats in Delhi's 70-seat Assembly, AAP was second with 28 seats and Congress was a distant third with only eight seats. In Madhya Pradesh, the BJP had a clean sweep with 164 seats in a 230-seat Assembly, Congress could get only 59 and others got seven seats. In Rajasthan, the incumbent Congress government was mauled by a BJP landslide: the Hindu party got 162 out of 199 seats which went to polls, Congress managed only 21 and others got 16. But Chhattisgarh was a neck-and-neck battle between the BJP and Congress. However, with 49 seats in a 90-seat Assembly the BJP had the last laugh which left Congress satisfied with only 39 seats. Votes will be counted in the remote Congress-ruled state of Mizoram on Monday. The Bharatiya Janata Party, or BJP, has waged a fierce campaign fronted by its prime ministerial candidate, Narendra Modi, who has charmed businesses but worried critics that his rise could worsen sectarian tensions between India's majority Hindus and its 138 million Muslims. Congress spokesman Randeep Singh Surjewala called the results disappointing but conceded “we have lost” in Delhi, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan. Modi offered congratulations by Twitter to Madhya Pradesh's incumbent chief minister “for BJP's wonderful performance,” and to the party in Rajasthan for “the historic victory.” The elections were seen as an important gauge of voter sentiment in this secular democracy of 1.2 billion, where there are no reliable opinion countrywide polls and at least one-fifth of the 800 million-strong electorate will be youths casting their first general election votes next year. Meanwhile, India's benchmark Sensex rose by 1.4 percent in the two days after the recent elections as markets cheered early signs of a strong showing by BJP. Triumphant Aam Aadmi supporters who had gathered at the party headquarters could be seen waving brooms — the symbol of its pledge to clean up politics. BJP activists celebrated in Delhi, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan, dancing to the beat of drums, bursting firecrackers and waving the party's lotus symbol.
