Voting for the West Bengal assembly elections concluded on Wednesday evening, and the exit polls are out, with most of them predicting the ouster of the CM Mamata-led TMC government after 15 years. The projections triggered a sharp offensive from TMC MP Derek O'Brien, who called out the past inaccuracies of such polls and challenged Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
In a post on X, O'Brien shared an infographic showing data from the 2021 exit polls and the actual results, which were contradictory. He wrote, "Credibility of Exit Polls? Bengal Polls 2021. How off the mark were the predictions from the final results?"
According to the TMC MP's illustrations, Axis My India had predicted a nail-biting contest with 143 seats for the TMC and 147 for the BJP. Similarly, C-Voter predicted 158 seats for TMC and 115 seats for BJP. Another exit poll had suggested 162 seats for TMC and 115 seats for BJP.
What happened in 2021
Although the TMC won the elections, as predicted by the majority of exit polls, the margin made it a landslide victory, which was far from what 2021 projections had indicated.
The TMC's figure stood at 215, while the BJP was stopped at 77. This year, P-Marq (150-175), Poll Diary (142-171), Matrize (146-161) have predicted a win for the BJP.
Other pollsters, like JVC and Chanakya have predicted a razor-thin battle.
A dare to PM Modi
MP Derek's outburst on pollsters came hours after he dared PM Modi to resign if the BJP fails to dethrone the Mamata Banerjee government.
In a video message, he had said, "Narendra, you had announced that you are the candidate for all 294 seats in Bengal. Drop the big talk. Accept this challenge."
"On May 4, when Mamata Banerjee and TMC win Bengal, resign from the Prime Minister’s post. Got the guts?" he wrote.
The second phase of voting concluded today in West Bengal, and the voter turnout was recorded over 92 per cent.