Exit-poll results Vs Results

As I write this blog, the Indian Parliament election result is being announced. The trend shows that the election pundits are once again proved to be inefficient in predicting the results. They predicted that JMM would be deciding the next government. For the uninitiated, JMM is Ms. Jayalalitha, Ms. Mamata and Ms. Mayavathi! The pundits predicted that NDA would form the next government with the support of JMM. They predicted UPA may get only as many if not less number of seats as NDA. The results speak a different story!

The media and the pundits used scientific methods and proper sampling for the survey. They partnered professional consumer survey companies to increase the accuracy of their predictions. In spite of such measures, they were caught unaware by the actual results. I wonder if their prediction mechanisms took voter's psych into consideration. It has been rumored that, this year more than any other years in the past, voters were paid to vote for a particular candidate. If that's true, what would the voters say when they were approached by the surveyors? Of course, they would say they voted for the party that paid them money even if they have voted for some other party. They have no reason to believe that the surveyor is actually from a post-poll surveying company and not someone from the party that paid them money. I don't know if the surveying companies considered this possibility!

If this reason is true or even partially true, then it can skew the results. If that's the case, can we then assume those parties that were predicted to win during the post-poll but lost when the actual results were announced, were actually that parties that paid the voters! Ineteresting!!