Prime Minister Modi leads closest rival Rahul Gandhi by 18%
By UK India Business Council (UKIBC)
Narendra Modi is best suited to be the next Prime Minister of India after 2019, according to a ‘Mood of the Nation’ poll conducted by India Today in collaboration with Karvy Insights across 97 parliamentary constituencies.
Modi remains popular, despite a testing first two years in government
The poll found Modi leading his closest rival, Rahul Gandhi of the Congress Party, 40 per cent to Gandhi’s 22 per cent.
After a less than straightforward first two years in office, this will come as some encouragement to Modi, whose personal ratings also remain high with 58 per cent of respondents rating his performance as ‘good,’ and only nine per cent rating it as ‘poor.’
However, these figures do represent a slight drop from his 2014 numbers, which saw him receive a ‘good’ rating from 61 per cent of respondents.
The poll’s other findings showed a slightly more nuanced picture, with respondents asked to choose Modi’s top five traits – three of which were negative, showing 20 per cent describing him as ‘all talk no action’, 12 per cent as ‘pro-rich’ and 12 per cent as ‘anti-minority’.
Modi’s popularity among the upper castes stayed strong at 54 per cent, but his popularity among Scheduled Castes/Tribes is only 33 per cent. Although a solid rating, this could erode if the economic outlook worsens.
In terms of challengers to Modi, Rahul Gandhi came out on top, with 32 per cent backing him as an alternative to Modi in 2019, followed by Sonia Gandhi on 15 per cent. Both also saw a significant increase in their overall popularity, with Rahul Gandhi reaching a net positive rating of 22 per cent up from eight per cent in August 2015, and Sonia Gandhi up to 11 per cent from five per cent in 2015.
Regarding policy, there was also mixed news for the NDA government, with a majority of 53 per cent claiming that Modi’s regime have failed to initiate action against those who have not disclosed their black money and assets located abroad since coming to power in May 2014. Further still, 58 per cent of those surveyed said that the NDA administration has not reduced or affected inflation since coming to office.
Modi’s foreign trips seem to be paying off however, with 53 per cent agreeing that they have ‘benefitted India’ and on corruption, a majority of 32 per cent believes Modi’s government have got a grip on the problem.
All in all the poll’s findings saw mixed news for the NDA government – a summation also found by our Modi Government Progress Report, where our members gave the administration an average score of 7/10.
You can download our report here.
