ABP CVoter Survey: Yogi In UP, Harish Rawat In Uttarakhand? These Are The Preferred CMs In Poll-Bound States

ABP CVoter Survey Assembly Elections: ABP News brings forth people's take on who is the most preferred chief ministerial candidate in poll-bound states of UP, Goa, Punjab, Manipur and Uttarakhand.

Uttar Pradesh CM Yogi Adityanath, Punjab CM Charanjit Singh Channi, Congress veteran Harish Rawat and Goa CM Pramod Sawant (PTI)

New Delhi: With elections to five states (Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Manipur, Goa, Uttarakhand) just a month away, a survey by ABP News along with CVoter for the month of January has thrown up interesting results on who are the most preferred chief ministerial candidates.

While the survey shows the incumbent CM as the preferred choice in Uttar Pradesh, Punjab and Goa (Yogi Adityanath, Charanjit Singh Channi and Pramod Sawant respectively), in Uttarakhand a majority of the respondents want Harish Rawat to head the government.

 

UTTAR PRADESH

In Uttar Pradesh, Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath leads the pack with 43% of the voters preferring him while Akhilesh Yadav gets the support of 34% of the voters. Former chief minister and BSP supremo Mayawati trails way behind with 14% while Congress's Priyanka Gandhi manages a little more than 3%. 

Adityanath, who is likely to contest the assembly election this time, has seen his approval ratings grow from 40% in September 2021 to 43% in January 2022. 

UTTARAKHAND

Congress veteran and former chief minister Harish Rawat is way ahead as the CM choice for Uttarakhand, with 37% of the respondents backing him, as per the survey. Incumbent chief minister Pushkar Singh Dhami has got the support of 29% of the voters, while Rajya Sabha MP and BJP spokesperson Anil Baluni is the third most preferred CM candidate with nearly 18% votes.  

The survey shows that the numbers for Harish Rawat have grown continuously since September 2021, when he was preferred by 30% of the respondents. It is rare for an incumbent chief minister to trail so far behind an opposition leader, but it should be noted that BJP changed three CMs within a year.

PUNJAB

Punjab has thrown up a surprise in this round, with the approval ratings of AAP's Bhagwant Mann as most preferred CM candidate shooting up to 23% from 13% in December. 

However, incumbent Chief Minister Charanjit Singh Channi is slightly ahead and is preferred by 29% of Punjabis as CM in 2022 polls. Interestingly this number corresponds to the perentage of Dalit population in Punjab. 

Congress chief Navjot Singh Sidhu is preferred by only 6% of voters. Arvind Kejriwal is preferred by 17% voters and Sukhbir Singh Badal is the choice of 15% Punjabis. 

There have been murmurs from AAP that Bhagwant Mann is the front runner as chief ministerial candidate. If the party declares him as the CM face, this could consolidate his numbers further. 

GOA

In Goa, incumbent CM Pramod Sawant is the most popular leader among those surveyed, with 34% approval. The second spot is held by AAP’s unnamed leader with 19% approval. Digambar Kamat of the Congress is their most popular leader with 9% approval.

Uttar Pradesh will go to polls in seven phases from February 10 to March 7. Punjab, Uttarakhand and Goa will vote on February 14 and Manipur will vote on February 27 and March 3. Counting of votes will be done on March 10.