In a previous blog post, we considered the possibility that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)'s strong performance in the Aruvikkara assembly constituency by-election marked the beginning of its revival in the state of Kerala. A closer examination of BJP leader O Rajagopal's previous election record suggests that this by-election result is a one-off, rather than the beginning …
Continue reading Too early to proclaim a revival in the BJP’s Kerala fortunes
Shortly before the counting of votes in Kerala's Aruvikkara assembly by-election, Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPM) state secretary Kodiyeri Balakrishnan make the startling claim that the entry into the contest of veteran Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader O Rajagopalan had made it difficult for his party to unseat the incumbent Indian National Congress (INC). He was right. The …
Continue reading The Congress should thank the BJP for its Aruvikkara assembly win
A simple average of the five most recent opinion polls shows that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) are locked in a dead heat in the 2015 Delhi state election, with a projected 40% share of the vote each. There is considerable variation among the five polls in terms of the …
The Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) continues to advance in the opinion polls. The NDTV-Hansa survey projects a majority for the alliance if elections were held in March: https://twitter.com/ndtv/status/455743412189155329 The CNN-IBN-CSDS-The Week election tracker is more cautious in its forecast, but has also projected a 20-seat improvement in the NDA's seats tally over the …
Voter turnout in the first three rounds of India's general election has shown a distinct increase by historical standards, particularly in some of the more populous states. https://twitter.com/MilanV/status/454435873321263104 This has given rise to speculation that this is bad news for the incumbent United Progressive Alliance (UPA). https://twitter.com/cvoter/status/454517133767372800 The UPA is clearly trailing in opinion polls, …
Continue reading No obvious correlation between turnout and anti-incumbency
The Association of Democratic Reforms has analysed 280 of 469 Lok Sabha candidates announced by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Indian National Congress (INC) and discovered that: https://twitter.com/ndtvvideos/status/447209053744549888 The data do not seem to be up as yet on the ADR website, so here is quick breakdown by party using the numbers quoted …
As more and more opinion polls hit the headlines, it's worth recalling how they fared in the two most recent general elections: 2004 https://twitter.com/PankajPachauri/status/408269945563136000 2009 https://twitter.com/PankajPachauri/status/444016247303176192 Note: The figures in parentheses under the NDA and UPA columns are the respective seat tallies of the BJP and Congress Party.
In response to my post on Political parties' Facebook "likes", Pragya Tiwari correctly pointed out that an additional flaw in that measure is the likelihood that parties and politicians purchase "likes", and that people "talking about this" might be a less manipulable figure. So here is some data (an evening's snapshot on Mar 1): https://twitter.com/dubeyamitabh/status/439781308999282689 …
Chunauti 