An opinion poll in the newspaper said 15 percent of Indians voted for the 64-year-old actor as the most popular citizen, far ahead of the five percent who backed star batsman Sachin Tendulkar and ruling Congress party president Italian-born Sonia Gandhi.

Bachchan got maximum votes from housewives -- 19 percent -- and those in the 35-45 age category in the survey of 1,005 people in Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai and Bangalore.

He was also the overwhelming choice in the Indian capital, where he completed college, where 31 percent voted for him.
The annual TOI-TNS poll conducted across five metros has voted Amitabh Bachchan by a fair margin as the Indian of the Year. 

An overwhelming 15% of the 1,005 people who polled in the TOI-TNS survey chose the Big B, while the next best, Sachin Tendulkar and Sonia Gandhi, got the thumbs up from only about a third that number. 

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Steel Baron Lakshmi Mittal, and Bollywood's current favourite couple Aishwarya Rai and Abhishek Bachcahan all got a 4% of the votes. 

Chennai was one city in which the Big B was pipped to the post by several others, including Sonia and Sachin, polling just 3% of the votes in this southern metro. 

In Bangalore, he was tied for the top slot with Infosys founder NR Narayan Murthy. 

Apart from the South, in Kolkata too, Amitabh Bachchan faced tough competition, where the state Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee was a close second to the Big B with 13% to his 14% and Nobel Laureate Amartya Sen a close third at 12%.