NUWJ, Patrakar Bhavan Trust hold ‘Open House’ discussion on Lok Sabha exit polls. “This poll did not deal with pressing issues. This time the contestants concentrated more on who gets majority rather the crucial issues confronting people of the country,” asserted experts.
Nagpur News: Tilak Patrakar Bhavan Trust and Nagpur Union of Working Journalists (NUWJ) on Wednesday hosted an Open House discussion, a sort of reflective analysis of what this general election has taught us and what it means to the nation, the region and to Nagpur. Nagpur’s intellectuals, editors, veteran journalists, and representatives of all political parties were present at Tilak Patrakar Bhavan to express their views on this gigantic electoral process and on the election scene even before the results are announced.
As the last phase of polling got over on May 12 and exit polls began to predict a victory for the BJP-led NDA under its Prime Ministerial candidate Narendra Modi, experts deliberated on what the actual verdict of the people would be or has been. The counting begins and results are announced on May 16, 2014.
Many personalities who participated in the discussion believed that there is no Modi wave at all in the country. It is just the anti-Congress wave which can help BJP win Lok Sabha Election 2014. Few economists did not find any leader in BJP who has economic sense hence found BJP-led Government dangerous for country in economic sense. However, some found that BJP is the only efficient option after Congress in front of the people.
Airing his views on Lok Sabha Election 2014, Group Editor of Dainik Bhaskar Prakash Dubey, said “Quantifying the percentage of voting, highest so far in the entire country, the figure hovers around more than 60 percent. However, it became evident that 40 percent did not vote which is a sad part.”
Chief Editor of Lokshahi Varta Laxmanrao Joshi opined, “The exit poll results should not be believed blindly.” Executive Editor of Sakal, Shailesh Pande and Joseph Rao of PTI, while expressing their views said, “First time voters may play a pivotal role in the outcome. However, many could not vote due to many discrepancies.”
Marketing Expert Sanjay Arora said, “In this 16th Lok Sabha Election, social media has emerged the biggest winner. The electronic media and social media played a very vital role and BJP used these means of publicity in a planned way to derive maximum benefits for the party. But Congress lacked the skill.”
Bal Kulkarni of Punya Nagari and Dainik Bhaskar’s Resident Editor Manikant Soni also agreed on this point with Sanjay Arora. Senior Journalist Shyam Pandharipande and noted economist Dr Shriniwas Khandewale did not find any BJP leader with economic sense and were not happy with the exit poll predictions.
Resident Editor of Maharashtra Times Shripad Aparajit, mentioning the role of media, said that the media needs to understand its responsibility and should behave maturely. Deputy Editor of Times of India Alok Tiwari praised Modi for galvanizing massive support for BJP in own style and asserted that Modi is more of a surfer on the wave.
Others who participated in the event and expressed their views on the subject include veteran journalist and former Press Council of India member Meghnad Bodhankar, social activist Rajkumar Tirpude, Bal Kulkarni of Punya Nagari, political parties’ representatives Jaiprakash Gupta (Congress), Ashish Deshmukh (BJP) and Ajay Patil (NCP).
Pradip Kumar Maitra, President of Tilak Patrakar Bhavan Trust, Shirish Borkar, Secretary, Bramhashankar Tripathi and Anupam Soni, President and Secretary of NUWJ respectively and Jaideep Hardikar were also present on the occasion.
