Chandigarh: Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal Wednesday described Shiromani Akali Dal's victory in Dhuri Assembly bypoll as a "resounding verdict" in favour of the policies, programmes and performance of its alliance government with the BJP in Punjab.
In Dhuri by-poll, SAD candidate Gobind Singh Longowal drubbed Congress-Sanjha Morcha candidate Simar Partap Singh, a political greenhorn and grandson of former Governor and Chief Minister Surjit Singh Barnala, by a handsome margin.
Expressing gratitude to the people of Dhuri constituency, the Chief Minister said, "This victory increases our responsibility and we are totally committed to live up to the high expectations that people have from us."
He said the Dhuri by-election result "truly reflects" the mood of the people of Punjab.
"It shows in the most forceful and categorical manner that the people of the state stand fully behind the policies and programmes of SAD-BJP combine government in Punjab. It is a powerful mandate in favour of government policies based on a complete commitment and emphasis on peace, communal harmony, development, progress and prosperity in the state," he said.
"The result also puts a decisive end to the propaganda of negative politics, vilification and cheap sensationalism on the one hand and to the false and hypocritical idealism of some parties to mislead the people on the other," Badal said in a statement here.
Badal, who is also the patron-in-chief of the SAD, said that the massive margin of the SAD-BJP victory is also a clear, categorical and forceful rejection of "divisive and opportunist policies" of our opponents.
The Chief Minister predicted that the "forceful Dhuri momentum and trend" would not only continue but would become even stronger for the general Assembly poll in 2017.
"It is just a trailer and a foretaste of things to come. The writing is clearly on the wall in bold print. Those who do not want to read it must be suffering from willful political blindness," he said.
SAD president and Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal also termed the victory in the Dhuri bypoll as a verdict in favour of the "pro-people development policies of the Punjab government" and a complete rejection of "negative campaign" run by the Congress.
"The by poll result has set the trend for the 2017 assembly elections in which the Congress will now face complete elimination," he added.
