My Columns: Without Fear and Favour

Elections. in India's 1st Elections website Home » Blog » Bihar’s Key Constituencies in Election Fray Bihar’s Key Constituencies in Election Fray By Deepak Parvatiyar September 30, 2015 5.00/5 (100.00%) 1 vote It is interesting that none of the leaders who ruled Bihar in the last twenty five years, with the exception of a stop-gap chief minister turned-Janata Dal (United) rebel Jitan Ram Manjhi, are contesting the elections this time. Outgoing chief minister and JD(U) leader Nitish Kumar, who is the Grand Alliance’s CM candidate  is a member of state legislative council decided against contesting the assembly seat. You may also like to read ·     Bihar CM Candidates ·     Bihar Election Updates ·     The caste game in Bihar What makes the situation more piquant is that even Sushil Kumar Modi, who was the state’s deputy chief minister of the state till 2013 during the Nitish-led National Democratic Alliance government, and who like Nitish is an MLC,

Elections. in India's 1st Elections website Home » Blog » Bihar’s CM contenders: Popular Choices Bihar’s CM contenders: Popular Choices By Deepak Parvatiyar September 28, 2015 3.00/5 (60.00%) 2 votes Let there be no ambiguity over the (lack of) credibility of pre-election surveys. Time and again their spurious accuracy has been exposed and only about one per cent of them could claim to be somewhat close to the final poll results. Consider that in the last general elections to the Lok Sabha in 2014, only Today’s Chanakya had come somewhat closer to the final outcome by predicting 291 seats for the Bharatiya Janata Party which finally got 282 seats and 340 seats for the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance, which got 336. Elections surveys and predictions are keen attempts not just to gauge the public mood but even to influence the public perception/opinion. Therefore, they are like double-edged swords. There is no denial of the chances of such election su