Curiously, exit polls on Sunday predicted a clear win for the BJP in the Lok Sabha polls. When several agencies came up with similar conclusions, and since some opinion polls in the past had made correct projections, the claims this time cannot altogether be wished away. Notable however is the fact that such a mood was not evident in the campaign, when the voters generally were silent, except for some violent activism in West Bengal. One will have to wait till May 23 to get a final picture.
The hints from the exit polls this time are that Prime Minister Narendra Modi will have the last laugh, and the principal Opposition the Congress party failed to win the trust of the people. Even the Hindi belt states of Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh, as also Delhi, are projected by the exit polls as turning pro-BJP in this round of polls. Too much of optimism or pessimism on either side at this juncture is unwarranted, as official results are yet to come.
If this is going to be true, the Opposition has clearly messed up with their prospects – by not standing united and fighting the polls separately, with a suggestion that a post-poll coalition can be cobbled a la Karnataka. This plea was advanced mainly by West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee, for fear that a pre-poll alliance will have to have the Congress in the forefront. Her prime ministerial ambitions did not allow her to proceed in that direction. The Opposition, as a whole, would now seem to have paid a heavy price.
It would appear that Prime Minister Narendra Modi and BJP chief Amit Shah, as also Rahul Gandhi, had some advance hints about the way the exit poll results were shaping up. Their assertions and body language proved that. Rahul Gandhi, who spoke to the media at the end of the campaign, was clearly downbeat. By contrast, Modi who shared space with Amit Shah at a party press conference in Delhi stated emphatically that he would return to power. Shah went to the extent of claiming, “We would get some 300 seats this time.” The exit poll results seem to veer round to such a figure.
It is not time for either side to have the last laugh. Exit poll results could go wrong as well. It will still be advisable to wait for three more days. If a fractured verdict is avoided, as also a hung parliament, that would be the real victory for the nation.