Vijayan remains first choice for CM's post in Kerala

New Delhi, Jan 18 (IANS) Sitting Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan remains the first choice for the Chief Minister's post in the poll-bound state, as per the IANS C-Voter Battle for the States survey.

According to the survey, 46.7 per cent of the respondents backed Vijayan for the Chief Minister's post. No other leader in Kerala came even close to Vijayan.

Senior Congress leader and former Chief Minister Oommen Chandy secured 22.3 per cent vote for the Chief Minister's post, while eight other political leaders in the state failed to secure even 10 per cent of the total votes. State health minister and senior CPI-M leader K.K. Shailja was placed third with just 6.3 per cent of vote share.

Senior Congress leader and the Leader of the Opposition in Kerala Assembly, Ramesh Chennithala, and K. Surendran of the BJP were jointly placed fourth with 4.1 per cent vote share.

Congress MP Shashi Tharoor received 3.7 per cent votes while senior Congress leader A.K. Antony was backed by 3.6 per cent of the respondents for the CM's post.

The survey included over 6,000 respondents covering all the 140 Assembly constituencies in Kerala.