Persistent blunders with exit polls endanger the credibility of mainstream media
Dr. Pranoy Roy was famous as a psephologist across
India before he became better known as the suave television anchor and sophisticated media entrepreneur. But for the latter two incarnations, Roy would be a deeply embarrassed man in contemporary times. Every time his news channels NDTV 24x7 and NDTV India touch an opinion and exit poll, the actual election results are so far off the mark that Roy and his merry band of pundits, psephologists and commentators start searching desperately for excuses to justify why their exit polls were worse than many forecasts made by asserted astrologers and tarot card readers. Yes, things have reached such a stage in mainstream media that Bejan Daruwala and Ma Prem Usha have more credibility when it comes to reading the mind of the voters than Roy and the ebullient Dorab Sopariwala. Of course, to be fair to Roy, he and NDTV are not the only culprits when it comes to hopelessly failing to forecast electoral outcomes. Virtually all mainstream TV channels fall into the trap. Says psephologist and political analyst Yashwant Deshmukh whose C-Voter conducted exit polls on behalf of Zee News, “Quite obviously, the exit polls of late have not been able to accurately predict electoral outcomes. Some soul searching is in order.”
The two biggest howlers of the year 2007 have been exit polls conducted for assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh and Gujarat. After the ballot boxes were sealed in Uttar Pradesh, not a single exit poll gave a majority to Mayawati and her party BSP. The best that she got was about 160 seats, almost 50 short of a majority. Mayawati ended up with more than 210 seats in the U.P. Assembly. Undeterred by the U.P. debacle, TV channels and psephologists were at it again during the Gujarat elections. While some ridiculously suggested that the Congress might storm back to power, most predicted that Narendra Modi was facing a daunting challenge. In the end, when election results were announced, Modi and the BJP had won a huge 117 seats and the Congress managed just 59 in an Assembly of 182 members. By the time early returns were coming in at about 11:00 AM on results day, Yogendra Yadav and Rajdeep Sardesai at CNN-IBN made a confident projection that the BJP will win about 95 seats.
Dr. Pranoy Roy was famous as a psephologist across
India before he became better known as the suave television anchor and sophisticated media entrepreneur. But for the latter two incarnations, Roy would be a deeply embarrassed man in contemporary times. Every time his news channels NDTV 24x7 and NDTV India touch an opinion and exit poll, the actual election results are so far off the mark that Roy and his merry band of pundits, psephologists and commentators start searching desperately for excuses to justify why their exit polls were worse than many forecasts made by asserted astrologers and tarot card readers. Yes, things have reached such a stage in mainstream media that Bejan Daruwala and Ma Prem Usha have more credibility when it comes to reading the mind of the voters than Roy and the ebullient Dorab Sopariwala. Of course, to be fair to Roy, he and NDTV are not the only culprits when it comes to hopelessly failing to forecast electoral outcomes. Virtually all mainstream TV channels fall into the trap. Says psephologist and political analyst Yashwant Deshmukh whose C-Voter conducted exit polls on behalf of Zee News, “Quite obviously, the exit polls of late have not been able to accurately predict electoral outcomes. Some soul searching is in order.”The two biggest howlers of the year 2007 have been exit polls conducted for assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh and Gujarat. After the ballot boxes were sealed in Uttar Pradesh, not a single exit poll gave a majority to Mayawati and her party BSP. The best that she got was about 160 seats, almost 50 short of a majority. Mayawati ended up with more than 210 seats in the U.P. Assembly. Undeterred by the U.P. debacle, TV channels and psephologists were at it again during the Gujarat elections. While some ridiculously suggested that the Congress might storm back to power, most predicted that Narendra Modi was facing a daunting challenge. In the end, when election results were announced, Modi and the BJP had won a huge 117 seats and the Congress managed just 59 in an Assembly of 182 members. By the time early returns were coming in at about 11:00 AM on results day, Yogendra Yadav and Rajdeep Sardesai at CNN-IBN made a confident projection that the BJP will win about 95 seats.
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