As the much-awaited 2019 General Elections inch closer by the day, a pre-poll survey conducted by ABP News-CSDS has predicted that the BJP-led NDA would win around 301 out of 543 seats in the Lok Sabha if the polls were to be held right now.
Conducted in 19 states, across 75 Lok Sabha seats and having 14,336 respondents, the second round of the Mood of the Nation (MOTN) survey also predicts the Congress-led UPA to win around 127 seats in the current scenario.
The range for the BJP-led NDA is 293-309 seats, while that for the Congress-led UPA is 122-132 seats, the survey states. When considering the BJP individually, the survey predicts that the party may fall short of the majority mark of 272 seats if elections were to be held right now.
Notably, in the 2014 General Elections, the NDA ended up winning 336 seats and the UPA won 60. Individually speaking, the BJP managed to go past the majority mark in 2014, bagging 282 seats, while the Congress got a paltry 44 seats.
The survey is further broken up region-wise to predict the performance of the NDA and the UPA in Northern, Western, Southern and Eastern India. While it predicts a strong performance for the NDA in the north, west and east of the country, it does point out to a dominant showing by the UPA in the south.
Furthermore, the survey claims that BJP would garner a vote share of 34 percent in today’s scenario, while for the Congress, the figure would stand at 25 percent.
Decline in Modi’s Popularity, Claims Survey
The survey has also studied various other parameters, including the preferences for Prime Minister, satisfaction with Modi government, and the biggest issue facing the country.
It observes that while Modi continues to be the most popular leader in the country, his popularity as Prime Minister has dipped among the people - from 44 percent in May 2017 to 37 percent in January 2018.
At the same time, Congress President Rahul Gandhi’s popularity has shown an upward tick, it says.
Same is the case with people's satisfaction with the Modi government's performance, which the survey says has declined significantly.
Lastly, the survey shows unemployment as the primary issue concerning the people of the country in the present scenario, followed by poverty, price rise, corruption, and GST and demonetisation.
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