Tamil Nadu CM Jayalalithaa fancied to take most seats, DMK to be second

Chennai: The exit polls might have excited several crowded living rooms of the politically conscious families in Tamil Nadu but all the political parties have rubbished them as yet another fiasco by overrated psephologists. Even otherwise, pollsters have often found predicting Tamil Nadu a nightmare, the disastrous exit polls in 2004 and 2009 were classic examples; none had imagined much less proclaim that the ruling AIADMK would draw blank in 2004.

Prediction-2014 is even tougher considering there are at least three imponderables. Multiple opinions exist on how the Modi factor worked out in rural Tamil Nadu, on how the people responded to problems such as the power cut and the 2-G impact on the DMK candidates. It was however clear from the very beginning that the DMK would suffer badly due to deserting the Congress, which has at least five percent votes in the worst of times.

Times Now this time has given the maximum number of seats to the AIADMK, 31 (out of total 39 contested in TN) whereas Headlines Today predicted only 22-24 wins and CNN-IBN gave 22-28.

Thanthi TV had done “the largest sampling of 32,000 voters in Tamil Nadu” before coming out with its exit poll predictions late Monday night AIADMK would ‘certainly’ win 24 seats and could end up with a score of 29, DMK would get five (including Dayanidhi Maran in Central Chennai) and the NDA four and possibly another two. There are six ‘doubtful’ constituencies including Thanjavur (T. R. Baalu, DMK), according to the channel.

Now the AIADMK leaders are upset that the exit polls “have not reflected reality”, which according to them is winning all the 39 seats in Tamil Nadu and the one seat in Puducherry.