'Manufactured At Home Two Months Back': Mamata Refutes Exit Poll Predicting BJP's Lead In Lok Sabha

The reaction of the Bengal CM comes as the exit polls on Saturday predicted the BJP outperforming its 2019 success and getting over 350 seats in the country.

Mamata Banerjee has refuted the exit poll findings ahead of Lok Sabha results.

Source : PTI

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Sunday said the exit poll predictions were not consistent with the ground reality and claimed that they have been manufactured at home two months back.

Claiming that such exit polls have no value, she criticised the media for showing them. The reaction of the Bengal CM comes as the exit polls on Saturday predicted the BJP outperforming its 2019 success and getting over 350 seats in the country.

"We had seen how the exit polls were conducted in 2016, 2019 and 2021. None of the predictions had turned out to be true," CM Mamata told TV9-Bangla news channel.

"These exit polls were manufactured at home by some people two months back for the media consumption. They have no value," the TMC chief added.

She said that the response of the people she got in her rallies didn't corroborate the exit polls predictions. 

"The way BJP tried polarisation and spread false information that Muslims were taking away quotas of SC, ST and OBCs, I don't think Muslims will vote for BJP. And, I think the CPI(M) and Congress helped the BJP in West Bengal," she said.

On the prospects of the opposition INDIA bloc, Mamata Banerjee said that Samajwadi Party supremo Akhilesh Yadav, RJD's Tejashwi Yadav, DKM's M K Stalin and Shiv Sena (UBT) cheif Uddhav Thackeray would do well.

“Regional parties will do well everywhere,” the TMC boss said.

When asked whether her ties with the CPI(M) and Congress in West Bengal would affect her chances of joining the opposition government if voted to power, Banerjee said, "I don't think there will be any hurdle at the all-India level unless the CPI(M) interferes… See every regional party has its own respect, and after talking to everyone, if we are invited we will go. We will take other regional parties along. But let the poll results be out first."

What Exit Polls Suggested?

The ABP News-CVoter exit poll on Saturday predicted a landslide victory for the BJP in West Bengal. While the BJP is predicted to win 23-27 seats in the state, Mamata's Trinamool Congress is expected to get 13-17 seats, as per the survey. The I.N.D.I.A bloc is likely to get only 1-3 seats in a major disappointment for the opposition parties in the state. 

In the last Lok Sabha elections in 2019, BJP had won 18 seats, Trinamool Congress 22, and Congress 2. In the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, polling in Bengal was held in all the 7 phases to elect 42 MPs in the state.