 "42 percent urban Indians undecided on whom to vote for in 2014, finds Google")
With 2014 just months away, the Lok Sabha election is by far the hottest topic of conversation in any room. That extends to the online space, which naturally means it’s time for a Google report on the forthcoming polls. Titled “Urban Indian Voters”, Google’s report aimed to measure the impact of the Internet and online citizens on the elections.
The offline survey was conducted across 108 constituencies, accounting for 20 percent of the total number. The entire survey covered 41,000 people, but the study’s focus was on 7042 respondents who are registered voters in the same constituency and are also active Internet users. The report found that 68 percent of the respondents fell in the age bracket of 18 to 35 years. 85 percent of the respondents have said that they have voted in previous elections. 64 percent of these fell in the age group of 18 to 25 years. 94 percent of the total respondents said that they will vote in the upcoming Lok Sabha elections, but a rather high 42 percent of the same were unsure of whom to vote for. In all, 37 percent of the urban Indian voter population is online and active.
A Google study looks at the impact of the Internet on next year’s Lok Sabha elections
The study found that both the political party as well as the local candidate is equally important for respondents in terms of influence on their voting decision. 35 percent said that their decision will be based on the political party while 36 percent said that it was the local candidate that was important to them. 11 percent said that the prime ministerial candidate of the political party will influence their final vote. The importance given to the local candidate was highest among users hailing from the western regions, standing at 45 percent, while the eastern regions registered a much lower 27 percent. This data was said to be constant across all age groups.
In addition to these findings, based on search trends this year from March 1 to August 31, the most searched politician is Narendra Modi, followed by Rahul Gandhi, Sonia Gandhi and Manmohan Singh. Sushma Swaraj, Digvijay Singh and Akhilesh Yadav feature in the lower rings of the list. In terms of political parties, the BJP, Congress and Aam Aadmi Party were the three most searched. Many users also searched for election related information, with the top query being how to get an election card and finding an electoral roll number.
Despite a surge in searches, the survey found that voters are unhappy with the amount of information currently available about political candidates online. While talking about a ‘wish-list’, 45 percent of the voters have said that better information about political parties on the Internet will help them make a more informed decision. 57 percent said that they would like to see more information being presented on local issues. 48 percent have said that they would like regular updates about development activities being undertaken in individual constituencies, while 43 percent have said that they want more information about the parties’ official manifestos.
Quite a few of the respondents said that they were keen to converse with politicians online. Political leaders with a strong online presence were perceived as being progressive and dynamic. While talking about personal political views, 65 percent of voters have said that they do not share their thoughts on social media platforms. One-third of the respondents have said that they consciously start looking for election-related information more than three months before the polls.
The findings of the survey were corroborated by search trends seen on Google. Data gathered showed that election-related search queries on Google start to peak three or four months in advance. A 500 percent growth in overall query volumes were registered during the last Lok Sabha elections. This year, because of the growing Internet penetration, the query volume has already increased by a staggering 800 percent. Mobile is becoming an important platform for accessing the Internet, with 25 percent of all queries coming from mobile phones.
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