1.EXIT POLL,UP POLL,HEADS WILL ROLL: Political Class, Common Man & even Marketmen have been immersed in Exit Polls to position themselves for the future. UP is the focus of attention. An unusual analysis to guess the Winner by asking: "How many seats will the Runner-up get?"
2.Election Opinion polling was pioneered by IMRB(my first job) in the 1980 Election where we predicted that Cong. led by Indira Gandhi would win BIG. She had lost BIG in '77 because of the after effects of Emergency & none believed she could make a comeback so soon. She got 353
3.Buoyed by this success IMRB continued to be a leader in the field but over time the success rate fell down. Even the others who followed met with limited success. Finally IMRB gave up Election Polling completely.
4. NDTV rose to prominence in this field & in collaboration with other Research agencies achieved some degree of success. Their "Waterloo" moment was in April 2004 Opinion poll predictions: Final Tally : NDA: 138; UPA: 145. 
5.Historically both opinion polls & exit polls have had very poor outcomes, mainly due to faulty research design in terms of sampling, questions & finally execution on the field. Having been personally involved in actual fieldwork, I noticed "Fear Factor" as a major issue.
6. Of late, Exit polls have apart from TRPs, hence advertising revenue, I suspect become vehicles to make money either through illegal Betting or positioning in the Stock Market, witness the wild swings between Exit Poll & Actual Results day. Obviously they do not reflect Reality
7.Recent Bengal Election Poll of Polls showed thus. Actual:: TMC: 215; BJP: 77; CPM: 0. This phenomena of getting it wrong is not peculiar only to India. In recent years ,Pollsters got Brexit & Trump's Election wrong.
8. Link to an article about history of Opinion Polls gone wrong in India jagranjosh.com/current-affair…
9.Focusing on UP: Since 1951 till 2017, UP has had 17 Assembly Elections. i)Anti- Incumbency is the theme since 1996 no party has come back to power back to back. ii)Hung Assembly only 3 times (1993/96/2002) iii) The Runner-up has got 80-100 seats 15 times. Only twice 109 & 110
10.The main issues usually are i) Law & Order ii) Unemployment iii) Inflation. This time 2 more issues : Farmer Distress & Health (Corona). UP votes on Caste rather than Community. All parties are aware & make suitable adjustments in selection of Candidates.
11. Usually 3 parties dominate: BJP;SP & BSP. This time BSP has receded into the Background, while Congress seems to have captured the imagination but vote catching ability is unknowable at this point of time.
12.FACTORS TO CONSIDER to arrive at a conclusion: i) BJP is the incumbent in an Anti Incumbency Verdict giving State. ii) Runner-up has almost always never crossed 100.iii).Voter seems to be keeping cards close to their chest iv).Exit polls credibility. Yet:
13.Predicting Stock Market & Politics is fraught with Danger, though am a keen student of both. While BJP & SP Bhakths may fight over as to who the Runner-up will be, Data analytics is telling us something. 125 could be outlier for the Runner-up since Cong may muddy the waters.
14.Take your pick who the Winner/Runner-up would be. I have already done, but like the UP voter am keeping the cards close to my chest.😷😉😎. Many heads are likely to ROLL on Thursday. Watch.
15. @threadreaderapp . Please unroll.
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