Macroeconomics Issue

COMMENTARY

methodology is poor which makes the sample profile unrepresentative. Though a scientific and representative sample determines the accuracy of the survey, there is no guarantee that a forecast based on the survey will be right. A survey has its limitations as it cannot capture the diverse and nuanced complexities and undercurrents of electoral behaviour and choices in India. Conclusions Contrary to their foreign couterparts, media opinion polls on elections in India have focused more on predicting the number of seats that major political parties are going to win or lose in the elections rather than on understanding the key issues facing the electorate. A recent sting operation on polling agencies also revealed that seat prediction

figures are on occasion manipulated in favour of their clients. Thus election surveys have been reduced to a media gimmick used only to predict the outcome of election results that quite often end up wrong or off the mark.

Notes

1 A post-poll survey is for measuring voting behaviour that has been developed in India. It is a unique method of conducting election surveys which was pioneered by the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS) in the 1960s wherein the voters were interviewed at home after the polling had been completed. The post-poll survey for measuring voting behaviour is purely an academic exercise done with the purpose of doing a post mortem analysis of the elections (Kumar and Rai 2013). An exit poll as its name overtly suggests is an election survey which is conducted among voters as they come out or exit from the polling station after casting their vote. This survey is also known as Election Day polling as the survey is conducted and completed on the day of polling (Kumar and Rai 2013).

3

A pre-poll survey as the name indicates is an election survey that is conducted before the elections are held for measuring popular choices about political parties, contesting candidates and political...