Chandigarh/IBNS: The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) top leadership is expected to retain Nayab Singh Saini as the Chief Minister of Haryana after the party secured a historic third term in the state assembly polls, media reports said.

The saffron party raced ahead of Congress in 49 of 90 assembly seats.  The Congress managed to get 36 seats in a tough fight where the exit polls majorly favoured the latter.

Even as the BJP leadership had made it clear ahead of the election that Saini would remain in the top post in case of a victory, there had been speculation about a change given his short stint and the caste angle.

Saini belongs to the other backward classes in a state that has mostly been led by Jats from the top post.

Saini was picked for the top post around 200 days ahead of the election.

His appointment to the top post was seen as a strategic pre-poll reshuffle that the BJP undertakes in states seen to have anti-incumbency. 

His predecessor ML Khattar was picked for the Lok Sabha election and upgraded to the post of a Union Minister.

Upsetting exit poll predictions, the BJP, which failed to secure an absolute majority in the Lok Sabha polls earlier this year leading to a coalition government, salvaged its prestige in Haryana by bouncing back on Tuesday for a historic third consecutive term by bagging 49 of the 90 seats in the state assembly.

In Jammu and Kashmir, which concluded a historic election to pick its government after a decade and post abrogation of Article 370, the National Conference-Congress alliance has swept, bagging 49 of the 90 seats.