The polling agency, Centre for Voting Opinion & Trends in Election Research, or CVoter, has predicted that the Congress-TDP alliance will defeat the ruling Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) in the upcoming election in Telangana, scheduled for December 7.
The survey, which has been conducted since August for ABP News and Republic TV, predicted that the TRS would only win a dismal 42 seats, while the Mahakutami or grand alliance which includes the Telangana Jana Samithi (TJS) and CPI besides the Congress and TDP, would bag 64.
It also predicted that the BJP would win 4 seats, while the others would win 9, out of the 119-member Legislative Assembly up for grabs. According to CVoter, the Mahakutami is expected to grab around 33.9 percent of the vote share, compared to 29.4 percent given to the TRS.
However, present caretaker Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao continues to be the top contender for his post. While 42.9 percent of those polled said that KCR was their preferred CM candidate, Congress leader K Jana Reddy got 22.6% of the votes. Revanth Reddy, a firebrand leader who defected from the TDP to the Congress earlier this year, also received 7.20 percent of the votes, while 27.30 percent were undecided.
Big surprise indeed. @Cvoter predicts a clear victory for Cong-TDP-TJD-CPI alliance in Telangana. Seems KCR's decision to go for early polls hasn't yielded what he had hoped for https://t.co/XMKSoebtAI
— Aditya Menon (@AdityaMenon22) November 9, 2018
Huge surprise. Congress-TDP alliance magic may sink TRS in Telangana says CVoter. https://t.co/4Taom73qfl
— Sumanth Raman (@sumanthraman) November 9, 2018
Meanwhile, in a related development, the Election Commission has banned all exit polls for the five poll-bound states of Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Mizoram and Telangana from November 12 till December 7.
Also, as per Section 126(1)(b) of the Representation of the People Act, 1951, displaying any election matter "including results of any opinion poll or any other poll survey" in any electronic media would be prohibited during the period of "48 hours ending with the hour fixed for conclusion of poll in each of the phases," the Commission said in a release.
"The Election Commission of India, in exercise of the powers under sub-section(1) of Section 126A of the Representation of the People Act, 1951 notified the period between 7 a m on November 12, 2018 and 5.30 p m on December 7, 2018 as the period during which conducting any exit poll and publishing or publicizing the result of exit poll by means of the print or electronic media or in any other manner shall be prohibited in the ongoing general elections," the order said.
While polling in Chhattisgarh is scheduled in two phases on November 12 and November 20, Madhya Pradesh and Mizoram would vote on November 28. Rajasthan and Telangana will go to vote on December 7.
IANS Inputs