Samikhsya Bureau
It may come as a set-back for many media houses and agencies hired by political parties to read the ensuing pulse of people for the polls in the waiting when the Election Commission has come out with a moratorium to stop making exit polls from April 11 to May 19. Regardless of the intent behind such a prohibition, it remains to be seen if the diktat does really become effective.
If there is any reasoning behind such a restriction then it has to be effective in letter and spirit and observers wonder if the EC can actually keep the exit polls under check . Essentially, such polls do impact on the coming polls but somehow it had been noticed in the past that the agencies concerned somehow leak such results through indirect methods that normally gets spread through television debates and analysis in prints.
Election Commission on Monday, prohibited conducting, publishing or publicising the results of exit polls between April 11 and May 19, during which the Lok Sabha polls will be held.
The Election Commission “has notified 0700 hours on 11.04.2019 and 1830 on 19.05.2019 as the period during which conducting any exit poll and publishing or publicising the result of exit poll by means of the print or electronic media or in any other manner shall be prohibited”, the poll body said.
Further, the Commission said that displaying any election matter including results of any opinion poll or any other poll survey, in any electronic media, would be prohibited during the period of 48 hours ending with the hour fixed for conclusion of poll in each of the phases in the respective polling area during the elections.
In the seven phase Lok Sabha polls, the first phase will be held on April 11 and last phase on May 19. The result will be declared on May 23.
In fact leading poll related survey agencies have already deployed their man power at different parts of the country, including states like Odisha for the first phase exit polls.
(With inputs from UNI)
