The Asianet News 2016 Kerala Assembly election opinion poll -C for Survey- has predicted that LDF will win the elections securing around 77 to 82 seats in the upcoming Assembly elections in April/May.
The poll also predicts that the ruling United Democratic Front will come second with 55 to 60 seats.
That the BJP is likely to gain three to five seats in the state would in itself be a first for both the party and the state, where the BJP is yet open its account in the state legislature.
The survey says that while the LDF would get 41% of the vote share, the UDF will secure 37% and the BJP front would manage to get 18%. This would be a significant rise in the BJP's vote share as it had managed to get only 6.03% of the total vote share in 2011.
What is significant about the poll is that inspite of the anti-incumbency factor and the controversies that the Oommen Chandy government is mired in, the LDF's vote share from 44.94% in 2011 will apparently reduce in 2016. This the pollsters say is because the NDA will eat into both UDF and LDF vote shares.
The survey which began on February 1 and went on till February 16 was conducted in 70 constituencies comprising 568 villages and 148 towns.
53% of the voters -according to the survey- believe that the Bharatiya Janata Party will be able to finally open its Assembly account in the state.
While 57% of those polled were convinced that allegations raised by the solar scam accused Saritha S Nair regarding Kerala CM Oommen Chandy is true, 65% believe that the solar scam will prove to be the cause for the UDF downfall while 19 % prefer to blame the bar bribery scam in this regard.
If the opinion poll is any indication, CPI(M) politburo member Pinarayi Vijayan might as well give up his chief ministerial ambitions as 56% of the voters consider the Lavalin Case to be a bone of contention in the coming elections.
Veteran leader of the Opposition VS Achuthanandan as usual emerged the crowd favourite with a whopping 73% wanting him to contest elections as opposed to a meagre 16% who opposed his candidature.
In the last Assembly elections of 2011, the Asianet opinion survey conducted on March 9, 2011 had predicted 77 to 87 seats for the UDF, 53 to 63 seats for the LDF and 0 to 5 seats for BJP. A second round of survey by Asianet News on March 31, 2011 revised the tally as 80 to 90 for UDF, 50 to 60 for LDF and 0 to 2 for BJP.
The actual figures in the 2011 state Assembly elections stood as 72 for the UDF, 68 for the LDF and none for the BJP.