Her election was announced by party general secretary Venkaiah Naidu who also added that along with her, a new ministry would be sworn in. This promptly sparked off speculation over who will be dropped from the Sahib Singh Cabinet.

Earlier, at a brief meeting of the legislative party at the BJP headquarters, where 46 of the 48 party MLAs where present, a sulking Sahib Singh proposed Swaraj's name. It was seconded by senior legislator Ram Bhaj.Among those who attended the meeting were the party's top brass including chief Kushabhau Thakre, senior leader L K Advani,party vice-president K L Shrama, party general secretary Venkaiah Naidu, state party president Mange Ram Garg and the former Delhi Chief Minister Madan Lal Khurana.

Outside, Sahib Singh's supporters kept up the show of strength chanting pro-Sahib slogans and heckling the MLAs who arrived for the meeting. A strong Delhi Police contingent had a trying time tackling the crowd which mobbed Sahib Singh's car. In a vain attempt to save the situation, Naidu said: ``They are all from the Congress. No BJP worker would have raised slogans against his own party.''

(According to a news agency report from Bharatpur, Sahib Singh has got support from the Haryana Lok Dal.

It has threatened to withdraw support to the BJP Government in protest against Sahib Singh's sacking. President Om Prakash Chautala said an emergency meeting of the party would be held in Jind on October 17 to discuss the issue.)

Apparently to appease the two warring leaders of the Delhi BJP, Swaraj laced her acceptance speech with praise for boththe Khurana and Sahib Singh Governments. ``With the help of Sahib Singhji and Madan Lalji, we have to go to people, to every jhuggi-jhonpdi for the November 25 elections. Whether it was the Khurana or the Sahib Singh Government, we have kept the promises we made to the people.''

Making it every bit an election speech, Swaraj said: ``We will present the Action Taken Report of the five-year performance of the BJP Government as against the 40 years of Congress misrule before the people. And we will come back with more seats than ever.''

She outlined a three-point poll strategy: Have the confidence to win, adopt an aggressive approach and fulfil all pledges. ``The Congress is trying to malign the BJP to create insecurity among the people. They will not succeed when the achievements of five years are put forward. The ATR will counter every Congress conspiracy to remove BJP from power,'' she said.

Meanwhile, an upset Sahib Singh grudgingly admitted that he would not contest the coming Assembly elections.``It is obvious. Atal Behariji told me yesterday that I will be inducted into the Central Cabinet. But I have not made up my mind. Now we will try to fight the elections together. That is the first job before us.'' Asked why his supporters had been harassing party functionaries, he said: ``They are deeply hurt by my removal, it's not because Sushma is here.''

Sushma Swaraj layee pyaaz

``I will sell onions at Rs 5 in Delhi,'' new Chief Minister Sushma Swaraj told cheering supporters. ``Sushma Swaraj layee pyaaz is the new slogan doing the rounds,'' she adds, beaming. Her supporters told her that ever since she was tipped to become Chief Minister, onion prices have come tumbling down. Apparently a little carried away, she then said that selling onions at Rs 2 was also not impossible.