Urban voters want more jobs: Survey

Chennai: Better job opportunity tops the priority list of urban voters in Tamil Nadu, while for people living in rural areas the most important issue is availability of agriculture loan, according to a survey done by Association for Democratic Reforms.

“Urban voters had different priorities. Employment was the highest priority for them, whereas for rural voters it was the number two priority. Urban voters also said noise pollution and the drinking water were the other two priorities. In the next category were health care, roads and traffic congestion. Every voter in Tamil Nadu named one of these six issues as important,” said the report released by ADR.

A survey of over 16,000 respondents was done in every constituency of Tamil Nadu before February 2016, ADR said. On the urban performance rating of government, the worst rated performance was on noise pollution and traffic congestion. Facility of cyclist and pedestrians on road and water and air pollution also did poorly according to voters. There were a total of 31 issues for which they gave priorities and rated government’s performance.

For the rural voters who still form the bulk of people in the state, agriculture loans, employment and electricity for agriculture were the top priorities. Around 24.75 per cent of voters said that agriculture loan availability was one of the top three priorities for them, followed by better employment opportunities for 22.88 per cent and electricity for agriculture for 20.72 per cent people.

On the other hand, reservation for jobs, education, terrorism, strong military, corruption, law and order did not feature on the top of the priority list for voters, the report said.

On the rural performance rating of government, the worst rated performance was on agriculture loan availability and better employment opportunities. Electricity for agriculture also did poorly according to voters.

Agriculture loan availability performance was ranked 27th out of 31, better employment opportunities 26th and electricity for agriculture 20th. The issue of agriculture loan availability was chosen by 22.79 per cent of voters as one of the two issues on which they wanted to rate the government. The priority issues where the government performance was considered relatively good were hospitals and PHCs, water for agriculture and sand and stone quarrying and mining.