A clutch of exit polls on Monday predicted a comfortable win for the BJP in Uttar Pradesh, while Congress may relegate itself to the margins with the real possibility of AAP ousting it from power in Punjab and its ambition to take the reigns of Uttarakhand, Manipur and Goa from the saffron party ending in a naught.
However, there is a note of caution about the exit polls as they went horribly wrong in several instances in the past. How the voters exercised their franchise in the elections to five states will be known only on March 10 when the actual counting of votes takes place.
Eleven exit polls showed the BJP retaining power in Uttar Pradesh – two of them giving more than 300 seats, while at least five of them giving below 250 and one predicting a close contest with the saffron party having a slight edge over its main opponent Samajwadi Party and its rivals.
For the BJP, pollsters are expecting a minimum of 180, the only poll – India News-Ground Zero Research – to predict such an outcome that said it could rise 220 at the most, and a maximum of 326 (and a minimum of 288 by India Today-Axis My India poll). The half-way mark in UP is 202.
The other poll that gave the BJP around 300 seats was the News 24-Today’s Chanakya (294 – +/-19 ) while giving SP just 105 (+/-19). Despite Priyanka Gandhi Vadra’s aggressive campaigning, the Congress is unlikely to improve its tally, if one goes by the exit polls that predicted a maximum of nine seats.
Times Now- Veto (225), Republic TV-P-Marq (240 – +/-15), ABP-CVoter (228-244), NewsX-Polstrat (211-225), Jann Ki Baat (222-260), ETG (230-2455), Matrize (262-277) and CNX (240-250) gave a definite edge to the BJP but did not share the expectations shown by Today’s Chanakya or Axis My India.
Except for one among the nine exit polls in Punjab, AAP is a sure winner with Today’s Chanakya even predicting 100 seats – which could rise to 111 – in a House of 17, while Congress may end up with just ten seats, which could rise to a maximum of 17. In a worst case scenario, Today’s Chanakya said Congress may end up with three seats.
Akali Dal – with majority of polls predicting it to win around 20 seats – has also not managed to fare better, while former Punjab Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh’s Lok Punjab Congress and his new ally BJP is also predicted to be faring badly – it could win between one to 13 seats in the best case scenario.
Of the ten exit polls, only two gave the Congress a chance to oust the BJP from power in Uttarakhand, though the ruling party is only likely to scrape through. The ABP-CVoter gave Congress 32-38 seats, while Ground Zero Research gave 37-41 seats ahead of the BJP. Eight other polls gave the BJP a slight upper hand.
Goa could see a cliffhanger of a contest with a likely hung assembly – four gave an edge to BJP, though it was not crossing the magic mark of 21, while two were really a neck and neck race.
The BJP may win a minimum of 13 seats and a maximum of 22, according to different polls while the Congress may win 12 to 25 seats, as per different predictions.
In Manipur where five exit polls were analysed, the BJP had a definite edge, though it was not crossing the majority mark of 31. While BJP is predicted to get more than 23 seats in the worst case scenario, Congress’s best case scenario was 17.
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