NEW DELHI: Traffic congestion, air and water pollution, and lack of employment opportunities have emerged as the most prominent issues that will influence voting in Delhi, according to a survey by Association for Democratic Reforms.
While employment is an issue for rural voters too, higher prices for farm products and uninterrupted power supply for agriculture are two other factors that will influence rural voting.

The ADR survey covered 534 constituencies across the country covering 2,73,487 voters (69% men and 31% women) to identify their priorities on specific governance issues, government’s performance on those specific points and factors influencing their voting behaviour.
In Delhi, questions were asked to 3,500 respondents in the seven parliamentary constituencies between October and December 2018. The analysis of voters’ priorities and performance of government in the form of ‘NCT of Delhi survey report – 2018’ was released on Wednesday. Since Delhi is 99% urbanised, the survey largely focussed on urban voters, the report said. The respondents were asked to prioritise issues out of 31 listed in the questionnaire and rate the government’s performance on a scale of five.
“It seeks to fill a vital gap in contemporary times, namely, evidence-based research and action on governance. For far too long we have depended entirely on ideology or the opinions of various experts. Though that is important, we also need to reflect on the priorities of the voters,” the report said.
Empowerment of women and security, better roads, noise pollution, public transport, garbage clearance, drinking water and policing were other important issues listed by the respondents. Garbage disposal is the responsibility of the municipal corporations while policing is under the Centre. That apart, the top eight issues that emerged in the survey come under the Delhi government.
The report says the Delhi voters believe the AAP government has managed to give an above average performance on only three parameters—public transport, roads and drinking water with the rating of 3.5, 3.16 and 3.06 respectively. The government’s performance has been below average to counter traffic congestion, air and water pollution and employment with the rating varying between 2.27 and 2.29. The respondents believed that the government performed abysmally poor in ensuring women empowerment and security and gave 1.85 rating.
Garbage clearance got a rating of 2.64 while law and order and policing were rated at 2.7.

AAP spokesperson Saurabh Bharadwaj said, “Women empowerment and safety is more of a social issue and the government is sincerely trying to address it. We believe DCW under Swati Maliwal tried her best but did not get support from LG and Delhi Police. Only way to improve law and order is to bring Delhi Police under the elected Delhi government. Had Delhi been a full state, we could have forced the municipal corporations to make the city cleaner.”
An overwhelming 97% of respondents agreed that candidates with criminal antecedents shouldn’t be elected.