For First Time, An Opinion Poll Gives NDA A Clear Majority

NEW DELHI: For the first time in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, a poll on Monday predicted a clear majority for any pre-poll alliance with NDTV projecting that NDA would get 275 seats in the 543-member House. This is 16 seats more than the poll had predicted last month.

BJP on its own would win 226 seats — the highest tally ever for the party and the best by any party since 1991, the poll done by Hansa Research estimated. UPA would win just 111 seats, with Congress sinking to its lowest-ever tally of 92 seats, it said.

NDA’s projected win is based on impressive gains over 2009 in UP (an increase of 41 seats), Maharashtra (17), Rajasthan (17), Bihar (12), Andhra Pradesh (12) and Madhya Pradesh (10). In these six states, it stands to gain 109 seats. In most other states too, NDA is projected to gain, though by more modest numbers.

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The only major states in which the NDA could do worse than five years ago are Karnataka (a loss of seven seats), Chhattisgarh (two) and West Bengal (one), according to the latest NDTV poll.

In contrast, the UPA is predicted to lose seats vis-a-vis 2009 in almost every major state, with Andhra Pradesh being the worst case, where the Congress tally could drop from 33 five years ago to just six this time.

Barring Karnataka and Chhattisgarh, the only states where the UPA stands to gain are Assam (a gain of two seats) and Bihar, where a gain of six is really only because RJD is now part of the alliance, unlike in 2009.

The largest parties after BJP and Congress would be Trinamool with 30 seats, AIADMK with 22, SP with 14 and BJD with 13. DMK, with its allies, is likely to win 14 seats and the Left 22. AAP is projected to win just one seat in Delhi and none elsewhere, at least in the states for which details were available, which included all those with seven seats or more.

None of these parties, however, will be of much significance if the poll’s predictions come true, since the NDA will not need any post-poll allies to form the government and anoint Modi the prime minister.