The art of misleading pollsters

I stopped believing in exit polls a long time adgo but I continue to believe in the astuteness of Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) president Sharad Pawar. Before the exit polls became fashionable and electronic voting machines (EVMs) were introduced in the country, Pawar has had an uncanny knack of getting his seat and poll estimates exactly right down to the last decimal.

So when Pawar expresses his disbelief in the exit poll results of this election, I would rather believe in his estimates than that of any pollsters. For I have more than just that reason for my disbelief – and the most significant of them is a lesson in misleading pollsters given to me by my domestic help a few years ago.

She had advised me to give a false impression to local surveyors in the constituency where we both resided – not only do party workers start bullying you weeks before elections to vote for their party, when you do vote they will be standing outside the polling centres demanding to know who you have voted for, she had said.

As a resident of a lower middle-class area, she and her neighbours had perfected the art of telling party workers and pollsters exactly what they wanted to hear and also of taking them for a ride. Party workers often paid the slum dwellers to vote for their candidate – my domestic help said she took money from all the parties, but ultimately voted for whoever she liked. Horrified, when I told her that was dishonest, she said without batting an eyelid, “I can make more money from them during an election in a week, than I can working for you for a whole year. Besides if they have enough money to waste, who am I to say ‘no’?”

But you can vote for only one person – don’t they know you are taking money from all and may not be able to give them a return, I asked. They do, she said. “But they take their chances. Besides they have to report back to their bosses that they have enough numbers of people and if at all anyone thinks to verify we nod along with everybody.”

Although I was horrified by this conspiracy of both misinformation and co-operative benefits, I realised it was not just my maid indulging in such untruthful acts – whole bastis and communities conspired to do the same. They decide to vote for one party but mislead all others into believing they are voting for them. She gave me specific examples and advised me to do the same to avoid being hassled by the various party workers.

While this was the story of one chawl, I am sure similar tactics are replicated across not just Mumbai and Maharashtra but the entire country.

For, a few years later, my aunt living in another state had her domestic help too, disappear for a few days during the local self-government elections. The unrepentant help, on her return, said she had gone to collect her share of saris and dhotis being given out by all political parties – six at the time –in the fray. Why should she get left out just because of a job in the city that would not give her as many goodies even during Diwali, she asked.

So even if the pollsters collecting data at polling stations are sincere about their jobs, I believe that at the best of the times when people were not as afraid of retribution as they are today, they were being hugely misled by voters. Now there is more pressure on them to keep their choices under wraps and so could be misleading the pollsters in even greater proportion.

This year’s exit polls are already proving unreliable, with several data changes being made by one agency, another giving votes to parties that have not contested in those constituencies and giving sweeps to political parties where they have no base at all. For the first time, even the gullible believers are raising eyebrows about the findings. Comically, even those political parties doing well in the exit polls have had their jaws dropping at their given figures.

While I do not believe these polls are based on scientific premises, even homogenous societies – like Australia last week and the United States during the 2016 presidential elections – could go horribly wrong. So I would rather wait for the actual results and not place my bets too soon. I am sure the best man and party will be victorious tomorrow. Why speculate before then?

First Published: May 21, 2019 22:19 IST