The ruling Shiromani Akali Dal swept the by-polls in three assembly constituencies of Punjab by drubbing rival Congress on Thursday with SAD president Sukhbir Singh Badal making his entry to the Vidhan Sabha. Sukhbir, who had to resign from the post of deputy chief minister for failing to make an entry into the state assembly within the stipulated six-month period after his nomination to the post, defeated Congress rival and former state minister Hans Raj Joshan by a margin of about 80,662 votes from Jalalabad Assembly seat, Election Commission office said.
The victory of Sukhbir, son of Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal, has paved way for his reinstatement to the post of deputy chief minister, SAD sources said. He is likely to take oath by this week end or the middle of next week, they said. In Banur and Kahnuwan seats also, SAD defeated their opponents with a comfortable margin. Former cooperation minister Capt Kanwaljit Singh's son Jasjit Singh Bunny, who had once parted ways with the SAD and later made an U-turn to join the party again, defeated Congress' Deepinder Singh Dhillon by a margin of around 20,219
The by-polls to the three assembly seats were necessitated as Jalalabad SAD MLA Sher Singh Ghubiaya and Kahnuwan MLA Partap Singh Bajwa of the Congress were elected to the Lok Sabha, while Banur representative Kanwaljit Singh was killed in a road accident in April this year. With Thursday's victory, the strength of SAD MLAs in the 117-member state assembly has risen to 51. While BJP has 19 MLAs, the strength of Congress is 42. Five are independents.
