BJP Dominates Election Polls But Loses Southern India

According to an opinion poll carried out in March in all of India’s 543 constituencies by India TV and CNX, Narendra Modi’s BJP and its allies are projected to win almost three quarters or 399 seats in India’s lower house Lok Sabha in this year’s national election which starts on April 19. Right now, the party’s National Democratic Alliance has 346 seats in the assembly, or 64 percent.

As Statista’s Katharina Buchholz reports, a landslide victory of the BJP had been predicted previously.

However, due to the loss of strategic allies and the party’s general weakness in the region, Modi’s results look less than perfect in India’s South, where constituents continue to vote for opposition parties like the Indian National Congress and its allies of the I.N.D.I.A. coalition. 

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Bloomberg Opinion points out that while the rejection of Modi in the South won’t matter this time around as the current prime minister has captured much of the populous North and Center, many of India’s progressive cities and regions are in this part of the country. Southern constituents are important for the country as a whole due to the region’s strong industries and flourishing economy but currently lack a sufficient voice in national politics, which has already led to friction with India’s leaders.

In Tamil Nadu, popular voting choices include Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK), the socialist leading party expected to win 18 seats (46 percent). Congress itself is projected to take another eight seats (21 percent) in the state, while unaffiliated All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK), which disassociated from the BJP last year, could win four (10 percent). In neighboring Kerala, the mostly-Congress aligned United Democratic Front (UDF) is expected to take 10 seats (50 percent) while another seven (35 percent) could fall to the communist-dominated Left Democratic Front (LDF), which has ruled the state legislature since 2016. In Telangana, Congress’ voting intentions would amount up to nine seats (53 percent).

Other Southern states where the BJP is expected to fare worse than in India overall are Odisha and Andrah Pradesh. Here, more unaligned parties are expected to win big, including Telugu Desam Party (TDP) and the ruling Yuvajana Sramika Rythu Congress Party (YSRCP) in Andrah Pradesh as well as Biju Janata Dal (BJD) in Odisha, where it also heads the state legislature. States in other regions where the BJP has a weaker showing are Punjab, where the Aam Aadmi Party is expected to win six seats (46 percent) and West Bengal, home to the newly unaligned All India Trinamool Congress, expected to take 19 or 45 percent of seats.