Rajdeep Sardesai is a complex man with many shades. The hate he harbours manifests itself when one least expects it. After demonising Narendra Modi for over 15 years, Sardesai seems to be getting tired of holding on to the hope that he might influence even one voter to listen to his drivel. But Rajdeep is a persistent man. He just never gives up. Sensing that PM Modi might just come back to power for a second term, he has proceeded to discredit the India Today Exit Poll which is yet to be aired.
Interestingly, first, he appeared to play up India Today’s Exit Poll which is to be aired after the polling is done for the last phase of 2019 Lok Sabha elections. He called the Exit Poll ‘most credible’ and took a dig at other media houses for calling their own Exit Polls ‘the biggest polls’.
24 hours to go for the ‘most credible’ exit poll (since everyone now claims they are the biggest!!).. see you 4 pm tomorrow.. #IndiaTodayAxisPoll pic.twitter.com/sp9PO8SYn8
— Citizen/नागरिक/Dost Rajdeep (@sardesairajdeep) May 18, 2019
Then, he did something truly bizarre. While tweeting a reminder of the Exit Polls, he proceeded to add a couple of caveats that ended up discrediting his own channel’s Exit Poll.
Reminder: #IndiaTodayAxisPoll this evening! Caveat 1 : exit polls are not a maths sum, can go wrong.. but a credible exit poll can capture a trend effectively. Caveat 2: the winner won’t be decided today but on 23rd! ?? pic.twitter.com/skMmEPa8qQ
— Citizen/नागरिक/Dost Rajdeep (@sardesairajdeep) May 19, 2019
Rajdeep Sardesai proceeded to say that a) Exit Polls can go wrong but generally captures the trend b) the winner won’t be decided today but on 23rd!
What Rajdeep perhaps tried to do here, sensing the possibility of the Exit Poll favouring PM Modi, BJP and even the NDA is that he he used his tweet as a dog whistle to impart some sort of hope to the Congress party and the larger ‘mahagathbandhan’.
Even before the Exit Polls went live, Rajdeep said that Exit Polls are not necessarily accurate thereby telling his fellow Congress supporters to hold on and not get disheartened if the Exit Polls show a Modi victory.
Then he goes a step further and says that the results would be announced on 23rd.
Any television channel would ideally play up their Exit Polls and take pride in their accuracy. Rajdeep Sardesai trying his best to convince people that Exit Polls are innacurate and basically trash can only be attributed to his own little dream that the Modi government should not, and would not, come back to power. Perhaps all Rajdeep can do right now is hold on to that hope for as long as he possibly can.
