Assembly elections 2022: EC bans exit polls from November 12, details here

New Delhi, Nov 10: In view of the upcoming assembly elections in two states, the Election Commission of India (ECI) has imposed a ban on conducting and publishing exit polls between 12 November and 5 December.

"EC notifies the period between 8 am on 12-11-2022 and 5.30 PM on 05-12-2022 as the period during which conducting any Exit Poll abd publishing or publicising the result of any exit poll in connection with Himachal Pradesh Elections and Gujarat Elections 2022 shall be prohibited," said the EC in a statement.

But, what are exit polls and how are they conducted?

Exit poll is a post-voting poll, that are conducted just after a voter walks out after casting his/her vote. Such polls aim at predicting the actual result on the basis of the information collected from voters. Also, the exit polls are conducted by a number of organisations. The basic step to predict exit polls is sampling.

According to Section 126A of the Representation of the People's Act, 1951, it puts a ban on exit polls from the period between the commencements of the poll until half an hour after the closing of the final phase of the poll.

However, it is not true that the exit polls are factual and correct all the time. In 2004, the exit polls had wrongly predicted the BJP-led NDA coalition winning again.