80% Indian-Americans to vote for Obama: poll

Indian-Americans would overwhelmingly vote for US President Barack Obama in the November presidential elections, while Mitt Romney has been named as favourite among the Republican presidential candidates, according to a latest opinion poll.

"Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney leads his nearest rivals Ron Paul by 24.1 percentage points and former Senator Rick Santorum by 33.4 percentage points," said the latest national opinion poll among Indian-Americans.

"But if the presidential elections were held today, an overwhelming 80% of Asian Indians would vote for President Barack Obama," said the first of its kind survey among Indian-Americans conducted by Boston-based INE Media Inc., the publisher of IndUS Business Journal and INDIA New England newspaper.

The online survey was conducted on February 22-26 with respondents coming from across the country.

"This is the first survey of Asian Indians during this presidential election season," said Upendra Mishra, publisher of IndUS Business Journal and INDIA New England.

"Indians have been primarily known in the United States for their entrepreneurial skills with excellence in the academic, scientific and technology fields, but now they're making their mark on both the local and national political scenes," Mishra said.

In the survey, Romney got the maximum support among the Republican candidates from the participants with 51.9%.

However, Obama got the commanding lead with 80% when pitted against the Republican candidates with Romney securing 14.7% support from the participants.