Nation wants mid-term election, Vajpayee as PM: opinion poll

Half the respondents in a nationwide opinion poll prefer a mid-term poll, with supporters of the Bharatiya Janata Party more keen than others for fresh elections.

The poll, conducted between April 2 and April 8 in 52 representative parliamentary constituencies in 16 states across the country by the ORG-MARG team which interviewed 13,065 registered voters showed that in case of a mid-term election now, the United Front could get 150 to 164 seats, a negative swing of 1.1 per cent. The UF consists of the Janata Dal, the Janata Party, the Samajwadi Party, the Samajwadi Janata Party, the Communist Party of India (Marxist), the Forward Bloc, the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam, the Tamil Maanila Congress, the Telugu Desam Party, the Revolutionary Socialist Party and the Asom Gana Parishad.

The BJP and its allies (the Shiv Sena, the Samata Party, the Akali Dal (Badal) and the Haryana Vikas Party) stands to benefit by a swing of 6.2 per cent and obtain between 237 to 253 seats. The Congress and its allies (the Kerala Congress (Mani), the Indian Union Muslim League and the United Goan Democratic Party) could suffer a negative swing of -2.2 per cent and manage 112-126 seats.

Fortyfive per cent of the respondents favoured a mid-term poll while 35 per cent didn't. The opinion poll was commissioned by the fortnightly India Today.

According to the magazine, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, who has had the shortest tenure as prime minister, was put way ahead of his rivals both within and outside his party when the respondents were asked who is best suited to replace Deve Gowda. Sixty two per cent of the respondents were aware that Deve Gowda is prime minister and wanted him to be replaced.

Forty nine per cent of the respondents opted for Vajpayee while Sonia Gandhi was placed second at nine per cent. At third place was Sitaram Kesri with six per cent.

Vajpayee also found support in 20 per cent of the traditional United Front supporters. They preferred him to TMC leader G K Moopanar who got 15 per cent and West Bengal Chief Minister Jyoti Basu (12 per cent). Among Congress supporters Vajpayee still polled 20 per cent, ahead of Kesri with 17 but far behind Sonia Gandhi with 27. Only one per cent of the Congress supporters backed Narasimha Rao, with only two per cent of the party members feeling he should be the next prime minister.

Among BJP supporters, Vajpayee polled 82 per cent while L K Advani was a poor second at five per cent.

On whether Sitaram Kesri's move to withdraw support to the UF government was justified, 53 per cent of the respondents said no while 38 per cent said yes. The rest were undecided.

The poll showed that nearly half the electorate was against the idea of the congress seeking outside support to form a government, with the resistance particularly stiff from urban voters (55 per cent).

Predictably, while a majority of Congress supporters (56 per cent) felt the party should go in for governance, the idea also struck a chord among a large percentage of Muslim voters (33 per cent).

Strangely, though the BJP government lasted a mere 13 days, more respondents were in favour of a bjp-led government than a Congress-led one. A fourth of both Congress and UF voters too felt that the next government should be led by the BJP.