UP seems headed for a hung Assembly in next year’s polls

New Delhi, Sep 17 (PTI) Uttar Pradesh seems headed for ahung assembly in the next year’s Assembly elections withBahujan Samaj Party emerging as the single largest party, aopinion poll has claimed. The "Mood of UP Survey" conducted by a monthly magazine’Parliamentarian’ says that that the ruling Samajwadi Partyseem to be losing heavily by as many as 150 seats and thespoils are being shared almost equally by the BJP and the BSP,with the latter having an edge. In the 403-member Assembly, the BSP, the survey claimed,will gain 89 seats over the 80 seats it has now and the BJP 88over 47 currently held. The Congress may end up with 13 seatsless than the 28 it had got in 2012 elections. The half-waymark for a simple majority is 203. Referring to Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav, the surveysaid 39 per cent of the voters rate his performance as bad orvery bad, while 33 per cent rate him average. But 28 per centvoters say his performance has been good or very good, "whichsuggests anti-incumbency may not be relevant in this case." It said BSP supremo Mayawati is leading the pack with 28per cent of voters wanting her as the next CM. But Akhilesh isclose behind with 25 per cent of popular votes. The BJP’s mostpopular leader seems to be Varun Gandhi who closely followsAkhilesh with 23 per cent votes. The magazine said the survey had a sample size 25,000people which was carried out last month in western, eastern,Avadh and Bundelkhand regions.PTI NABVSC