Prashant Kishore, a poll strategist who had predicted that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) would win a comfortable majority in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, has admitted that his assessment was wrong.
“Yes, I and pollsters like me were wrong, and we are ready to be humble,” he reported. India Today, To quote Kishore:
Like Kishor, at least 10 exit polls predicted the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) to win more than 350 seats for a majority, and three more predicted it would win more than 400 seats, while the Indian Union was predicted to win fewer than 180 seats.
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However, on the day of the counting of votes, the NDA won 292 seats and the Indian Bloc won 232 seats, defying almost all exit poll predictions.
Kishore said he had to admit on camera that the assessment he had made was wrong by 20 per cent in terms of numbers.
“We had said that the BJP would get close to 300 votes, but it got only 240,” Prashant Kishore told India Today.
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However, the poll strategist added that while there is some anger against Narendra Modi, there is no widespread discontent.
Kishore said people should not have obsessed over the numbers, but added that if you go beyond the numbers, they are not far off the mark: “After all, their vote share is 36 per cent, which is status quo. In terms of vote share, it’s a drop of 0.7 per cent.”
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After the final vote on June 1, Kishore slammed his critics.
“Next time, when you talk about elections or politics, don’t waste your valuable time on nonsense and analysis of fake journalists, loudmouth politicians and self-proclaimed experts on social media,” Kishore posted in Hindi on X.
In an interview with PTI in April, Kishor suggested that Rahul Gandhi should consider stepping down if the Congress party does not get the desired results in the Lok Sabha elections.
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