3:30 pm, Seminar Hall
Power and Limitations of Opinion Polls
Rajeeva L. Karandikar
Chennai Mathematical Institute.
03-02-16

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Abstract

How can obtaining opinion of, say 30,000 voters be sufficient to predict the outcome of an election in a country with over 70 Crore voters? Do the opinion polls conducted say a month before the election accurately predict what is to happen on the voting day?

We will address such questions and show that simple mathematics and statistics, lots of common sense and a good understanding of the ground reality or domain knowledge together can yield very good forecast or predictions of the outcome of elections based on opinion polls and exit polls. I will share my own experiences with opinion polls and exit polls over last 18 years.

This is essentially the same talk that I gave at CMI about 2 years ago. This is specially for the current students.