Chandigarh, March 10 : The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) on Thursday appeared set for a landslide victory in Punjab, leading on 90 of the 117 assembly seats after virtually crushing all its opponents in a hard fought assembly election. With AAP candidates forging ahead even in known strongholds of Punjab’s traditional parties, many stalwarts of the Congress, Akali Dal and BJP among others appeared set for defeat. While AAP Chief Ministerial candidate Bhagwant Singh Mann was headed to win in Dhuri, all former Chief Ministers including Parkash Singh Badal, Amarinder Singh, Rajinder Kaur Bhattal and incumbent Charanjit Singh Channi were trailing by big margins. The Congress was a distant second, leading in 17 seats, the Akali Dal on six seats and the BJP on three. Amarinder Singh, who was ousted from the Chief Minister’s post by the Congress months before the elections, was trailing on the Punjab Lok Congress ticket in Patiala Urban by over 10,000 votes behind Ajit Pal Singh Kohli of AAP. Channi, whose relative was arrested by the Enforcement Directorate weeks before the February 20 election, was trailing from both constituencies: Chamkaur Sahib and Bhadaur. In both places, the AAP appeared set to win. Akali veteran Parkash Singh Badal, the most senior politician in India, was trailing in Lambi to AAP’s Gurmeet Singh Khudian by over 5,000 votes. In Amritsar (East), AAP’s Jeewan Jyot Kaur was leading, leaving Congress’ Navjot Singh Sidhu at the second place and pushing Akali candidate Bikram Majithia far behind. As AAP’s victory appeared certain, party leader Raghav Chadha said his party has not just won a state but emerged as a national force. “AAP will emerge as the national and natural replacement to Congress,” Chadha said in Chandigarh. He also said that in future the Arvind Kejriwal party will emerge as the main challenger to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) at the Center. AO ING MR