Tuesday, 09 Jun, 2026
By: Team CVoter
Source: Sansad TV
A 40% share of Indians believing their quality of life has deteriorated is unusual - considering that such sentiments were observed only in 2021, 2022 (covid years, 50.7 and 46.6 respectively) and in 2018 (42.4post GST implementation).
The first Union Budget of the Modi 3.0 government did not receive a warm welcome on social media despite the broadening tax bases, increasing standard deductions marginally. However, if there is one more thing that should worry the newly elected coalition government - it should be the sharp drop of Indians feeling a drop in quality of life, as reported by a CVoter survey.
Each year since 2015, polling agency CVoter has been conducting ‘instant polls’ right after the conclusion of the Finance Minister’s speech using the Computer Automated Telephonic Interview Technique over a demographically representative sample.
This year, the survey was conducted twice - during February right after the interim budget speech and the one on 23rd July. Data shows a sharp drop in people’s sentiment towards the economic aspects of their life.
When asked - compared to the last year - how do you think your quality of life has changed - nearly 43% respondents said that it had ‘deteriorated’. This is a sharp decline compared to the interim budget presented for the same fiscal - when only 38.8% respondents responded the same.
A 40% share of Indians believing their quality of life has deteriorated is unusual - considering that such sentiments were observed only in 2021, 2022 (covid years, 50.7 and 46.6 respectively) and in 2018 (42.4post GST implementation).
The share of people who believe that their situation has improved is also very low - 17.4% - the second lowest in the last ten years (17.3% in 2021 is the lowest). In 2019 - right before the second election of NDA government - this was at its peak - when 42% respondents said their quality of life had improved.
Largely the share of Indians who said that their quality of life has remained the same - is stable - about 36%.
The pessimism also reflects for the near future - when asked what is their perception on their quality of life in the next one year - about 31% said ‘it will deteriorate’, 34.1% said it will remain the same and only 26.4% said it will improve.
