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India Today-Axis exit poll projects better strike rate for BJP vis-a-vis Sena
A break-up of seats projected by the India Today-Axis exit poll indicated that the BJP would win between 109 and 124 seats while the Shiv Sena would get 50-70 seats implying a much better strike rate for BJP.
The BJP would retain power with a bigger mandate in Maharashtra which voted for a new assembly on Monday, according to projections by the India Today Axis exit poll. The exit poll commissioned by the news channel said the BJP-Shiv Sena combine would get between 166 and 194 seats while the Congress-Nationalist Congress Party alliance will get 71-90 seats in the 288-member assembly. The majority mark is 145 seats.
The India Today-Axis exit poll forecast is in line with other exit polls commissioned by television channels that have also projected a BJP victory. Other exit polls have, however, forecast a bigger margin for the BJP-led ruling coalition which, in contrast to the 2014 elections, decided to contest the 2019 election in alliance with the Shiv Sena. The two partners had gone solo in 2014.
Hindustan Times has not conducted any exit polls on its own, or partnered with any agency for the purpose, and cannot independently verify the authenticity of the polls.
The votes for the two state assemblies - Haryana and Maharashtra - will be counted on October 24. An election exit poll, not always known to be correct, is a poll of voters taken immediately after they exit the polling stations.
A break-up of seats projected by the India Today-Axis exit poll indicated the BJP would win between 109 and 124 seats while the Shiv Sena would get 50-70 seats. If the exit poll did get the projection right, it would imply that the BJP has a much better strike rate than the Shiv Sena.
Priyanka Chaturvedi of the Shiv Sena, however, dismissed suggestions that it signalled the decline of the party’s support base and insisted that both the Sena and the BJP would continue to grow at the expense of the opposition.
The India Today-Axis exit poll also forecast that the BJP-led coalition may have received 51 per cent vote share against the Congress-led alliance’s 29 per cent in Mumbai. In western Maharashtra, the Congress-NCP combine could have got 43 per cent of the votes cast against the BJP’s 38 per cent.
