Missing The Leader
The nation seems to be in the middle of a leadership crisis. An opinion poll conducted by ORG-MARG for INDIA TODAY shows that both Vajpayee and Sonia Gandhi's popularity ratings have dropped, leaving the people yearning for a strong leader like Indira Gandhi.

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FROM THE EDITOR IN CHIEF

Since its inception, India Today has been a great believer in opinion polls. While instant polls-over the telephone, on the Internet and confined to metros-often masquerade as national opinion polls, we have always believed in doing nationwide polls in spite of their heavy cost. The India Today Mood of the Nation poll, carried out in collaboration with ORG-MARG, takes into account the diversity and complexity of India. We commission opinion polls not merely during elections, but also twice a year to track the shifts in the public mood. Our current poll was an elaborate exercise, involving a sample size of 17,400 in both urban and rural India. From a defined sample in 16 states, 500 field workers contacted voters over 10 days and 30 tabulators worked round the clock for 48 hours to ensure timeliness.

The results of the poll confirm that the nation is witnessing a serious crisis of leadership. The popularity ratings of the prime minister and the leader of the Opposition have fallen at the same time compared to the previous poll published in January this year.

The somewhat surprising revelation of the poll is that the person considered India's greatest prime minister is Indira Gandhi, overshadowing her illustrious father Jawaharlal Nehru. Coincidentally, she was the politician whose triumphant comeback we anticipated in our first predictive opinion poll in 1980. The preference for Mrs Gandhi is also ironic, given that her years in office were intensely controversial. She was responsible for the imposition of the Emergency and the distortions in Centre-state relations, and her tenure was marked by an overbearing and imperious style of governance.

The reason Mrs Gandhi's rough edges have been erased from public memory cannot merely be time. Perhaps it is because in the confusing era of coalition politics, Indians now look to their government for strength and decisiveness. Qualities Indira Gandhi was never short of. Hopefully, our current leaders will take the hint.

(Aroon Purie)

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