While UPFA won comfortable majorities in the north central province and south central Sabaragamuva provincial councils, it also managed to emerge as the single largest party in the multi-ethnic eastern province, above the ethnic Tamil party.
The results were a setback to the Tamil National Alliance (TNA), once a proxy of LTTE, that was banking on Tamil support to be voted to power in the former battleground state where the Tamil Tigers were defeated in 2007.
President Mahinda Rajapaksa had called snap elections to win public approval of his development agenda and to answer the international critics of his campaign against the LTTE's separatist war.
In the Sinhalese-dominated north central and south western provincial council, the ruling party won a total of 49 out of 77 seats.
However, the more keenly watched fight was in the multi- ethnic eastern provincial council, where the election had been billed as a test of the political inclination of the Tamils in the aftermath of a military end to their demand for self rule.
In the eastern provincial council, the UPFA emerged as the single largest party winning 14 seats in the 37-member council, while the TNA won 11 seats, and the UNP won 4 seats.
The Sri Lanka Muslim Congress (SLMC), that is in alliance with the rulian coalition at the Centre but fought the provincial election independently, won 7 seats. The ultra Sinhala nationalist National Freedom Front won a solitary seat in this province. (MORE)