Elections are here so are pre-polls, exit polls and opinion polls.
The Election Commission of India has imposed conditions for conduct of exit polls which should be one hour after of the end of the poll. But it is not clear whether that poll should be restricted to the poll for each State or the last poll of the last State when simultaneous elections are held in several States.
The Supreme Court of India has also decreed that it will not outlaw the opinion polls.
This lenient attitude of the Constitutional bodies betrays the soft cornor towards those who run the Govt. The same attitude also shows that these polls have the approval of the political parties both within and without the government as the polls come handy to them to influence the voters in a wrongful manner.
No wonder that the big businesses and political parties compete with one another to own TV channels, print and electronic media houses. Mukesh Ambani himself declared that he has controlling share in 70 TV channels that can influence 80 crore people and it is estimated that 800 newspapers are also in his pocket. Adani controls NDTV whose polls, if not all, mostly come out with the results that favour, you know whom.
The logical conclusion therefore is that these polls are biased and carefully interpreted to favour their patrons or partrons' patrons.
According to the People Representation Act, the secrecy of the vote is invioblele both at the time of voting and afterwards. Hence the exit polls are unconstitutional.
Neither business organisations nor media houses should have a say in influencing the voters. They can however inform the people of the compliance of the political parties in power to the promises made by them and whether the Government is true to the guarantees given by the Constitution and Rule of Law ,the soul of representative democracy. On this count, opinion polls which are mostly designed to influence the voters are tantamount to disguised disinformation perpetrating post truth exploitation of the sacred electoral process.
That politicians' baleful influence on the big newspapers is accepted by Jhon Swinton, the Chief of Staff of the New York Times through the words: "There is no such thing, at this date of the world's history, in America, as an independent press."
Austria’s Chancellor, Sebastian Kurz, is under investigation over claims that government money was used to get positive coverage in a tabloid newspaper.
The big media organizations, dubiously owned, have lost their credibility giving rise to the social media and independent channels like this one thanks to ubiquitous availability of internet. These channels are countering the malfeasance of the captive big channels but their ability to do so is limited by their resources vis-a-vis the more-loyal-than-the king biggies.
The Oraellian control of the people's opinions unleashed by the politicians and aided by the big media houses and the other constitutional bodies need to be countered by these independent channels, concerned organizations like Association for Democratic Reforms, Civic and Human Rights Forums and concerned citizens.
Anything that unduly influences the voters' opinion, directly or indirectly, is an anthema to democratic polity.
Dr M H Prasad Rao
Hyderabad
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