Celebrations broke out in the BJP camp in Telangana on Friday as the party made huge gains to win 46 seats in the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) elections, emerging as the second largest party.
State BJP leaders and party cadres celebrated the party's poll success with fireworks and distribution of sweets. Some party workers were seen dancing amid beating of drums, raising slogans.
There was all round jubilation at the state BJP headquarters as leaders arrived there with the counting of votes entering the final phase.
Union Minister of State G. Kishan Reddy, BJP's national Vice President D.K. Aruna, party's OBC Morcha President K. Laxman, state BJP President Bandi Sanjay Kumar and other leaders celebrated the party's success with the cadres.
The BJP, which had won just four seats in the 150-member GHMC in the 2016 elections, put up an impressive show to become the second largest party and thus deny Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) a clear majority in the municipal body.
The counting of votes saw many twists and turns throughout the day. When the counting of postal ballots was taken up, the BJP was ahead of the others. The party was shown to be leading in 80 divisions. Congratulatory messages by party leaders had started doing the rounds on social media.
However, the celebrations proved premature when the ballot boxes were opened and TRS established early leads in most of the divisions. At one point it looked as if the TRS will get a comfortable majority but in the neck-and-neck race, the BJP overtook TRS in about 15 divisions to emerge as the second largest party.