Modi magic? Poll magic? BJP vote share to increase to 33% in UP -- Poll.

WITH NARENDRA MODI moving to the forefront of national politics and receiving accolades for every speech and every public appearance that he makes, it’s only a question of time before the BJP announces that it will fight the next Lok Sabha polls under his leadership as its PM candidate. Possibly the announcement will come as early as at the two-day national executive meet at Goa on June 8-9.

Against this backdrop, a poll has been conducted by the popular news website LensOnNews.com to gauge the right-wing party’s prospects in the heartland state of UP – which sends the largest contingent of 80 MPs to the Lok Sabha. The survey was designed to explore the two scenarios: the outcome of the coming Lok Sabha election in UP if the BJP were not to declare any PM candidate; and secondly if it were to go into the elections under the leadership of Modi as its candidate for PM.

The survey findings show that the BJP would be a big gainer in the second scenario – ie if it fights the elections under Modi’s leadership. In the first scenario (without any declared candidate for PM), the BJP would be in the third position in a four-cornered contest, behind Mulayam Singh’s SP and Mayawati’s BSP, with the Congress bringing up the rear.

The picture changes dramatically in the second scenario with Narendra Modi as the declared candidate for PM. The BJP vaults to the first place with a 33 percent vote share (against only 20 per cent in the first scenario) and as many as 47 seats of UP’s total of 80 (against only 19 seats otherwise). BJP’s increased share of seats and votes would come at the cost of all the other three contenders, SP, BSP and Congress – in that order.

There is clearly a strong wave of anti-incumbency sentiment against the Congress party and the UPA government at the Centre. As many as 74 per cent of the respondents want a change at the Centre and 53 per cent want their present MP out. Forty-nine per cent see price rise as a major failure of the Central government, while it is its failure on the corruption front that most concerns 22 per cent of the voters. The Congress is in for a steep decline in its vote share, with its seats tally dropping sharply to just 12 in Scenario 1 and a measly 7 seats in Scenario 2.

Clearly, the UP voters want a performance-oriented and corruption-free government at the Centre and see Narendra Modi as the only leader who can provide it. Without such an alternative, UP’s votes get scattered among the four leading parties; but with Modi’s projection as its leader the BJP has the opportunity to run away with the lion’s share of UP’s Lok Sabha seats.

The Samajwadi Party which swept the UP assembly elections last year seems to have squandered its mandate under the leadership of its young CM Akhilesh Yadav. With a majority of the voters disenchanted with the state government due to the dismal law and order situation, power cuts and corruption, the party stands to get only 13 Lok Sabha seats. And, ‘Netaji’ Mulayam Singh, himself an aspirant to be PM, is likely to see his ambitions go nowhere.

Asked about their opinion as to who would make the best PM, 30 per cent of the voters name Narendra Modi, 18 per cent Rahul Gandhi and 16 per cent Mulayam Singh.

The findings of this survey are consistent with our Bihar poll published on May 2 which showed the BJP standing to gain as many as 29 of Bihar’s 40 Lok Sabha seats if it chooses to project Narendra Modi as leader. With such a strong showing in the two leading heartland states (and along with expected gains in Rajasthan, Maharashtra etc), the BJP should be in a favoured position to bid for power at the Centre following the next Lok Sabha elections.

The LensOnNews survey was conducted among a representative cross-sectional sample of 2200 voters in 15 parliamentary constituencies of UP from May 3 to 13, 2013. The poll findings carry a margin of error of four per cent.