Nitish favoured for CM, but BJP could win: What the pre-poll surveys on Bihar say so far

Just a day after the dates for the five-phased Bihar Assembly polls 2015 were announced by the Election Commission (EC), opinion polls have begun predicting the results of the highly charged state polls. [caption id=“attachment_2429166” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] PM Narendra Modi (left) and Bihar CM Nitish Kumar. PTI[/caption] The India Today Group (ITG)-Cicero pre-poll survey has predicted that the BJP-led alliance in the Bihar will win simple majority in the polls. According to the survey, the BJP-led alliance will win 125 seats in the Bihar Assembly elections thus crossing the 122 mark which is required to win a simple majority in the 243-member state Assembly. The JD(U)-RJD-Congress grand alliance, according to the survey, will win 106 seats. Other parties will win a total of 12 seats, the survey added. The ITG-Cicero survey also said that the BJP-led alliance, including LJP, RLSP and HAM, will win 42 percent of the total votes while JD(U) will win 40 percent. The survey predicted that even though the most-favoured choice for the post of Bihar Chief Minister was Nitish Kumar, the people of the state wanted a BJP-led alliance government. Meanwhile, an opinion poll taken by India TV channel said that the mahagathbandhan or the grand alliance of JD(U)-RJD-Congress is projected to win between 116 and 132 seats in the Bihar Assembly, PTI reported. The BJP-led combine has been projected to win within a range of 94 to 110 seats, according to the poll conducted by C-Voter, according to a press release issued by the channel. On the question of who is the best chief minister, a whopping 53 percent respondents favoured incumbent Nitish Kumar, while only 18 percent preferred BJP leader Sushil Modi and only 5 percent preferred Lalu Prasad and Shatrughan Sinha. Percentage wise, the Lalu-Nitish-Congress combine is projected to win 43 percent votes this time, while the BJP-led combine is projected to win 40 percent votes. 17 percent went to ‘others’. C-Voter said the projections were based on a methodology based on random stratified sample of 10,683 interviews covering all the Assembly constituencies during the last week of August and the first week of September. The margin of error is plus/minus 3 three percent at the state level and plus/minus 5 percent at the regional level, the poll agency said. In the 2010 Assembly elections, JD(U) and BJP had won 206 seats by going together in an alliance while Lalu Prasad’s RJD-led alliance with Ram Vilas Paswan could win only 25 seats. However, during the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, the NDA comprising BJP, Paswan LJP and Upendra Kushwaha’s RLSP won in 174 Assembly segments. The Lalu-Nitish combine could win only in 51 Assembly segments in the face of Modi wave. (With inputs from PTI)