Most Indians say 'thumbs up' to second Bush term

While President Clinton did much to "reduce the poison" of past American policy, in the words of Mr. Rajamohan, the Clinton administration continued to browbeat Delhi about its nuclear-weapons programs and its strong-arm military strategy in its ongoing fight with separatist movements in Kashmir and in the northeastern states. President Bush, by contrast, hasn't backed some treaties that restrict nuclear proliferation - including the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty - and with his administration, the browbeating stopped.

But it was terrorism that ultimately brought Delhi and Washington together, says Rajamohan. "After the attacks of Dec. 13 [on India's parliament building] the US for the first time defined groups based in Pakistan as terrorists. They began to hold Pakistan accountable for their actions."

Saeed Naqvi, a longtime political observer here, says that he has doubts about how representative the PIPA poll is. "I have a feeling that most Indians are neutral about America's role," he says. "The government of India is proceeding cautiously and intelligently, saying no to Iraq, yes to cooperation in the Indian Ocean," referring to ongoing tsunami-relief efforts.

But assuming that the poll is representative, Mr. Naqvi contends that India's positive feelings toward Bush are the result of lack of exposure to global events.

"Any society that has been mobilized by their media has some negative feelings toward America," he says. "But look at India's media. There is not a single Indian news organization represented in Iraq. If you turn on the TV, it's just Laloo and the Shankaracharya," he quips, noting two Indian national figures currently involved in scandals. "It's sheer parochialism."

Pollster Doug Miller, president of GlobeScan, defends his polls results, saying they are consistent with other polls conducted over the past few years.

But he admits that the sample of Indians who participated all came from such urban areas as Delhi, Bombay (Mumbai), Calcutta, and Madras (Chennai), a fact that might skew the findings somewhat.

"The importance of the rural section of the population was something we saw in the last Indian election," Mr. Miller says. Polls conducted in urban areas gave the then-ruling center-right coalition a wide lead over the center-left Congress Party; but Congress won with overwhelming rural support.

Even so, Miller says, "The Indian results did not surprise me, given what we have seen in past polls."

Yet while Indians seem to support the overall war on terrorism - a war that many here say mirrors its own war with militants in Kashmir - few Indians are willing to see their country send troops to Iraq. Sixty-seven percent were opposed to sending Indian troops to Iraq, while 18 percent were in favor, according to the poll.

"This puts India in the mid-range of other countries," says Miller. On average, 70 percent of people in other countries surveyed by GlobeScan don't want to send their troops to Iraq.

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