Exit polls seem to have missed the target

Pollsters appear to have missed the target once again in their projections in two of the states -- Punjab and Uttarakhand -- and even Uttar Pradesh threw up figures that did not match the predictions.

Most of the opinion polls publicised last week predicted that Congress will emerge clear victors in Punjab and Uttarakhand but the counting of votes proved the other way.

Except for two, all the exit polls predicted a hung assembly in Uttar Pradesh with Samajwadi Party on top but the results showed that the Mulayam Singh Yadav-led party romped home with a thumping majority.

However, the exit polls almost hit the bulls eye in smaller states of Manipur and Goa.

Demonstrating how seriously such polls are taken by the Election Commission, its chief SY Quraishi recently tweeted, "opinion and exit polls should at best be on entertainment channels."

Those who find fault with exit polls always point to the previous goof-ups by the psephologists.

The exit polls in UP were not dot on, although most of them gave SP an edge over the ruling BSP. But most of the projections were far from the results.

The Star News-AC Neilson exit poll said SP would get 183 seats, followed by BSP with 83 seats, BJP 71 and Congress at fourth with 51 seats. Headlines Today polls showed SP getting between 195 and 210 seats followed by BSP with 88-98 seats, BJP with 50-56 seats and Cong-RLD combine with 38-42.

Similarly, India TV-C-Voter exit poll showed SP winning 137-145 seats followed by BSP with 122-130 seats, and News24 and Today's Chanakya poll claiming SP would win 185 seats.

Another poll by CNN-IBN-The Week-CSDS had even gone over board by projecting SP bagging 232 to 250 seats in the 403-member Assembly.

However, results show that SP won over 220 seats and BSP around 80.

In Punjab, the CNN-IBN-Hindustan Times exit poll predicted equal vote shares for both the Congress and the Akali-BJP combine with each winning about 40-50 seats in the 115-member Punjab Assembly.

Another survey by News24 and Today's Chankya had given Congress an edge in the state saying the party would win 60 seats and the Shiromani Akal Dal-BJP combine will win only 52.

However, the picture is quite different now. The ruling SAD-BJP alliance won 68 seats, creating history in the state Assembly that has not seen the incumbent returning to power in the last 46 years. The Congress managed to get only 46 seats.

In Goa, the India TV-C-Voter exit poll projected that BJP will get 20 seats followed by Congress with 17 seat. But the prediction went horribly wrong, as BJP has comfortably secured absolute majority in the 40-member Assembly.

The party has won 20 seats and was leading in one more while the ruling Congress managed to win in just nine seats.

In Uttarakhand, the Star News poll predicted BJP will retain power with winning 36 seats, while Congress will get 29 seats. Other polls had claimed Congress would win over 30 seats and BJP will be restricted to winning less than 30.

However, the two parties are being seen in tough battle in the state. BJP has won 28 seats and was leading in three others while Congress has won in 27 and was leading in five seats in the 70-member Assembly.

The exit polls during 2009 Lok Sabha elections also had missed the target as they failed to predict the comfortable positioning of the UPA.

Most of the exit polls had predicted that UPA would get 195 to 202 seats while the final tally was 262. Opposition NDA was pegged to get 175 to 198 but they ended at 156.

The exit polls for the 2007 UP polls had also failed to predict Mayawati's BSP getting majority on its own.

Politicians always had a disdain for such predictions.

One of the strong critics of exit polls, senior Congress leader Digvijay Singh had termed such exercises as "frauds".

"Exit polls are frauds. How can you define the votes of 12 crores voters in such small sample sizes? Tell me which exit polls have been accurate in predicting results in the past," he said referring to exit polls on Uttar Pradesh.