Nearly as soon as unofficial Senate election results started airing on the media, statements from leaders of political parties started flowing thick and fast.

Former prime minister Nawaz Sharif's daughter, Maryam Nawaz, was among the first to share screenshots of news tickers on Twitter, thanking God for PML-N's heavy victory in Punjab.

Pointing out that PML-N had become the "single largest party in the Senate as well" Maryam lauded party members and supporters for "changing the tradition of politics" and for standing by Nawaz.

The PML-N's interim President and Punjab Chief Minister Shehbaz Sharif declared his party's majority win in the Senate a "victory" for the public.

Interior Minister Ahsan Iqbal also celebrated PML-N's heavy win "despite [a] Supreme Court verdict" that had forced the ruling party's candidates to contest the elections as independent candidates.

Iqbal termed it "a victory for democracy".

Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan — after refusing to vote — questioned the Senate elections process, claiming that the polls had been marred by "shameful horse trading".

Khan pointed fingers at the PPP, which — quite surprisingly — managed to bag two seats from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa with only seven MPAs in the province.

PTI leader Asad Umar was seemingly happy with the results and congratulated Chaudhry Sarwar for becoming the "first ever PTI senator from Punjab". He also praised Faisal Javed Khan, who won from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, in a series of tweets.

On the other hand, MQM-P leader Farooq Sattar expressed disappointment over the result results, claiming that some of his party's MPAs had "sold themselves".

"If the party had not been in disarray, Kamran Tessori would have won," he told the media.

MQM's upstart Bahadurabad faction's deputy convener, however, expressed satisfaction with the results and said that the party had expected to win one seat since they only had 31 MPAs.

Faisal Subzwari from MQM-B congratulated Barrister Farogh Naseem — also MQM-B — on the latter's victory and apologised to supporters for the "pain and worry" caused by the weeks of drama in the lead-up to the election.