ADR-Daksh Survey Report for Rajasthan region
The Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) has conducted the largest ever survey in India with over 250,000 respondents in 530 Lok Sabha constituencies. The larger purpose of the survey is to highlight voter priorities so that elections in future are fought on voter issues, and more importantly, the manifestos of future Governments reflect voter priorities.
In Rajasthan , the purpose of the survey was multi-fold:
- To Rate MPs from the state on a Scale of 10
- To know Top 10 pressing issues for voters in the state
- To know voting behaviour of people
- To know what is the role of caste, religion, crime and money power in elections
The findings of the survey:
Rating of MPs: The voters have rated the performance of MPs as Good, Average or Bad on governance issues like employment, water, electricity, roads, food, education and health.
The highest scoring MP from Rajasthan is SACHIN PILOT of Congress from Ajmer constituency with 8.00 points (Above average), followed by the DRJYOTIMIRDHA of Congress from Nagaur constituency with 7.40 points (Above average).GOPAL SINGH of Congress from Rajsamand constituency is on the 3rd position with 7.15 points. The lowest scoring MP fromRajasthan is BHARAT RAM MEGHWAL of Congress from Ganganagar constituency with 4.20 points.
The survey has also tried to identify the gap between voters' expectations on governance issues and performance of MPs on those issues. If the expectation of voters score is more than the performance score it means voters are unhappy. And if expectation of voters score is less than the performance of MPs then voters are actually happy.
However,out of 25 MPs from Rajasthanonly 7 MPshave exceeded the expectation of the people. And 9 MPs performed above average.
Please see the Table I for individual performance rating of all the MPs from Rajasthan . (The 'Overall Performance Rating ' column is the actual rating of the MPsand the 'Expectations of Voters on Governance issues' column shows people's expectations from their MPs on a scale of 10)
Top 10 pressing issues for voters.To identify what are voter priorities in terms of governance issues like water, electricity, roads, food, education and health, a list of 30 items was given to voters and they were asked to rate whether a particular issue was High, Medium, or Low. This list was comprehensive as less than 5% said that there were "other issues" beyond the list.
In Rajasthan, Better roads, Better employment opportunities and Drinking waterare the Top 3 issues about which people are most concerned.
Please see Table II to know the overall 10 most pressing issues for the people of Rajasthan which they want their MPs to focus on, Table III for top 10 issues in rural areas of the state and Table IV to know top 10 issues in urban areas.
Table –I
| Constituency | Name of MP | Party | Expectation Score of Voters | Overall Performance Rating | Average Performance |
| 13-Ajmer | SACHIN PILOT | INC | 7.11 | 8.00 | Above Average |
| 14-Nagaur | DR JYOTIMIRDHA | INC | 6.86 | 7.40 | Above Average |
| 22-Rajsamand | GOPAL SINGH | INC | 6.53 | 7.15 | Above Average |
| 23-Bhilwara | C P JOSHI | INC | 7.29 | 7.00 | Above Average |
| 25-Jhalawar-Baran | DUSHYANT SINGH | BJP | 6.47 | 6.91 | Above Average |
| 16-Jodhpur | CHANDRESHKUMARI | INC | 6.61 | 6.91 | Above Average |
| 4-Jhunjhunu | SHEESHRAM OLA | INC | 7.04 | 6.86 | Above Average |
| 12-Tonk-SawaiMadhopur | NAMO NARAYAN | INC | 7.49 | 6.83 | Above Average |
| 21-Chittorgarh | GIRIJA VYAS | INC | 6.13 | 6.80 | Above Average |
| 15-Pali | BADRI RAM | INC | 6.30 | 6.53 | Below Average |
| 11-Dausa | KIRODILAL | IND | 6.65 | 6.52 | Below Average |
| 3-Churu | RAM SINGH KASWAN | BJP | 6.69 | 6.46 | Below Average |
| 6-Jaipur Rural | LAL CHAND KATARIA | INC | 6.57 | 6.21 | Below Average |
| 7-Jaipur | MAHESH JOSHI | INC | 6.67 | 5.92 | Below Average |
| 18-Jalore | DEV JI PATEL | BJP | 7.55 | 5.79 | Below Average |
| 5-Sikar | MAHADEV SINGH | INC | 7.58 | 5.76 | Below Average |
| 17-Barmer | HARISH CHOUDHARY | INC | 6.41 | 5.53 | Below Average |
| 2-Bikaner | ARJUN RAM MEGHWAL | BJP | 7.16 | 5.04 | Below Average |
| 10-Karauli-Dholpur | KHILADILALBAIRWA | INC | 6.95 | 5.02 | Below Average |
| 20-Banswara | TARA CHAND | INC | 8.21 | 4.67 | Below Average |
| 24-Kota | IJYARAJ SINGH | INC | 9.54 | 4.56 | Below Average |
| 19-Udaipur | RAGUVEERSINGH | INC | 8.61 | 4.52 | Below Average |
| 8-Alwar | JITENDRA SINGH | INC | 9.54 | 4.41 | Below Average |
| 9-Bharatpur | RATAN SINGH | INC | 8.54 | 4.27 | Below Average |
| 1-Ganganagar | BHARAT RAM MEGHWAL | INC | 7.82 | 4.20 | Below Average |
| Rajasthan | 7.28 | 5.99 |
Overall Top 10 issues for Rajasthan :
Table –II
| S. No. | Issues | Expectations of Issues as perceived by voters (scale-10) |
| 1 | Better roads | 7.64 |
| 2 | Better employment opportunities | 7.63 |
| 3 | Drinking water | 7.55 |
| 4 | Better hospitals / Primary Healthcare Centres | 7.53 |
| 5 | Better electric supply | 7.51 |
| 6 | Better schools | 7.50 |
| 7 | Better public transport | 7.47 |
| 8 | Subsidized food distribution | 7.34 |
| 9 | Better Law and Order / Policing | 7.30 |
| 10 | Eradication of Corruption | 7.27 |
Top 10 issues in Rural areas:
Table –III
| S. No. | Issues | Expectations of Issues as perceived by voters (scale-10)** ** |
| 1 | Better roads | 7.66 |
| 2 | Better hospitals / Primary Healthcare Centres | 7.61 |
| 3 | Better employment opportunities | 7.59 |
| 4 | Drinking water | 7.57 |
| 5 | Better electric supply | 7.55 |
| 6 | Better schools | 7.54 |
| 7 | Better public transport | 7.52 |
| 8 | Subsidized food distribution | 7.33 |
| 9 | Better Law and Order / Policing | 7.32 |
| 10 | Empowerment of Women | 7.24 |
Top 10 issues in Urban areas:
Table –IV
| S. No. | Issues | Expectations of Issues as perceived by voters (scale-10) |
| 1 | Better garbage clearance | 7.73 |
| 2 | Better employment opportunities | 7.72 |
| 3 | Better roads | 7.58 |
| 4 | Drinking water | 7.50 |
| 5 | Better electric supply | 7.42 |
| 6 | Better schools | 7.40 |
| 7 | Eradication of Corruption | 7.35 |
| 8 | Subsidized food distribution | 7.35 |
| 9 | Better public transport | 7.34 |
| 10 | Better hospitals / Primary Healthcare Centres | 7.32 |
| 11 | Food prices for Consumers | 7.32 |
The voting behavior of people in Rajasthan
The survey tried to identify the important factors that people take into account before voting for a particular Candidate. Issue like whether the Candidate matters the most or his Political Party or other issues like caste/religion of the Candidate, PM Candidate of the party, and Distribution of 'gifts' etc. are more important?
People in Rajasthan gave more importance to the candidatehimself than the party of the candidate. ThePM candidate of the party and Caste/Religion of the candidate were the 3rd and 4th most important factors which voters consider before voting.
Please see the Table V to find out important factors which people consider before voting for a candidate and what weightage (points) they give to each of the factors:
Table –V
| State | Rajasthan |
| Why people vote: | |
| Party | 6.88 |
| Candidate | 7.52 |
| PMCandidate | 6.49 |
| Caste/religion | 4.74 |
| Distribution of 'gifts' | 4.00 |
| Yes/No"knowledge and opinion questions": Do you know | |
| "Gifts"for vote is illegal | 80.82% |
| Candidates distributing 'gifts' | 31.78% |
| You can get candidate criminal record | 33.85% |
| Why do people vote for those with serious criminal records: | |
| Candidate does good work | 71.10% |
| Powerful Candidate | 35.17% |
| Spending in elections | 44.72% |
| Cases not serious | 40.68% |
| Voters don't know | 50.19% |
| Casteor religion | 45.36% |
Role of caste, religion, crime and money power in elections. The survey also tried to identify if voters are aware of the use of money and muscle power in elections. Specifically, whether they are aware of distribution of gifts and money by candidates before polls or they have the knowledge about the criminal record of their candidates.
It was observed that nearly 81 per cent of people in Rajasthan is well aware that distribution of gifts and money by candidates ahead of elections is illegal. However, only 34 per cent of people knew that they can get an information about the criminal records of their candidates easily.
What is also observed that over 71 per cent people in Rajasthan ignore the criminal record of their candidates because they feel such candidates have done "good work."Whereas around 45 per cent of people in Rajasthan vote for candidates facing criminal charges because they were of their own caste/ religion. Around 45 per cent people also vote for criminal candidates because they spend a lot of money during the elections.
