Opinion and exit polls may have been trashed over the years given their being wide off the targets. This time around though while most of the exit polls were right as they gave the BJP-led NDA the advantage in coming to power, it was the survey agency Today’s Chanakya which hit the bull’s eye. Incidentally, it had predicted almost accurately the results of the Delhi Assembly elections too.
Today’s Chanakaya — News 24 exit polls survey had given NDA a total of 340 seats, with the BJP alone winning 291 seats. It is bang on target. Till the time of going to press, the NDA was leading or had won in a total of 333 seats with the BJP leading or having won in 283 seats.
Chanakya’s projection was lauded during the last Assembly polls, particularly for its evaluation on the Aam Admi Party’s (AAP) performance for the Delhi Assembly polls. It had projected AAP to win 32 seats, while Congress was to be reduced to single digit in the 70 Assembly seats. It had also predicted that Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit would lose badly.
Most of the leading channels and sephologists had given AAP a maximum of 12 seats (that too in liberal estimate). While others in the last Assembly polls said that Chhattisgarh may go to Congress, Chanakaya was the only one to say that BJP would return to power.Apart from the national figure, Chanakya also got it right for Rajasthan by predicting that the Congress could be wiped out. This was in sharp contrast to Times Now which shockingly predicted that Congress could win 14 of the 25 seats in the state. The BJP won all the 25 lok Sabha seats there.
On AAP, most polls agreed that it would make its presence felt, in Punjab in particular, but yet again there was disagreement on just how well it would do. The News24 poll said the party could emerge as the single largest in Punjab, winning five of the 13 seats while others gave it no seats at all. AAP turned out victorious in four seats finally.