Measuring Voting Behaviour in India 8132110447, 9788132110446

Citation preview

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

Thank you for choosing a SAGE product! If you have any comment, observation or feedback, I would like to personally hear from you. Please write to me at [email protected] —Vivek Mehra, Managing Director and CEO, SAGE Publications India Pvt Ltd, New Delhi

Bulk Sales SAGE India offers special discounts for purchase of books in bulk. We also make available special imprints and excerpts from our books on demand. For orders and enquiries, write to us at Marketing Department SAGE Publications India Pvt Ltd B1/I-1, Mohan Cooperative Industrial Area Mathura Road, Post Bag 7 New Delhi 110044, India E-mail us at [email protected]

Get to know more about SAGE, be invited to SAGE events, get on our mailing list. Write today to [email protected]

This book is also available as an e-book.



Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

Sanjay Kumar and Praveen Rai

Copyright © Sanjay Kumar and Praveen Rai, 2013 All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. First published in 2013 by SAGE Publications India Pvt Ltd B1/I-1 Mohan Cooperative Industrial Area Mathura Road, New Delhi 110 044, India www.sagepub.in SAGE Publications Inc 2455 Teller Road Thousand Oaks, California 91320, USA SAGE Publications Ltd 1 Oliver’s Yard, 55 City Road London EC1Y 1SP, United Kingdom SAGE Publications Asia-Pacific Pte Ltd 33 Pekin Street #02-01 Far East Square Singapore 048763 Published by Vivek Mehra for SAGE Publications India Pvt. Ltd, Phototypeset in 10.5/12.5 Adobe Caslon Pro by Diligent Typesetter, Delhi and printed at Saurabh Printers Pvt. Ltd, New Delhi. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Kumar, Sanjay, 1967–   Measuring voting behaviour in India/Sanjay Kumar and Praveen Rai.     pages cm   Includes bibliographical references and index.   1. Voting research—India.  2. Voting—India.  3. Elections—India. I. Rai, Praveen.  II. Title. JQ292.K865     324.954—dc23     2013     2013011442 ISBN: 978-81-321-1044-6 (PB)

The SAGE Team: Neelakshi Chakraborty, Rohini Rangachari Karnik, and Vijay Sah

Contents List of Illustrations Foreword by Yogendra Yadav Preface 1. Measuring Voting Behaviour and Attitudes

vii ix xv 1

2. A Historical Overview of Election Studies in India

13

3. The Multiple Methods of Measuring Voting Choices

34

4. Importance of Scientific Sampling in Election Survey

54

5. Questionnaire, an Important Tool for Collecting Information

75

6. Fieldwork and Data Collection

98

7. Analyzing Data and Reporting Survey Findings

125

8. Limitations and Emerging Challenges

142

References Index About the Authors

160 166 174

List of Illustrations Tables 4.1. Simple Random Sampling Method

64

4.2. Systematic Random Sampling Technique

65

4.3. Sample Size and Distribution at Three Levels of Precision for 95 percent Confidence Level

67

4.4. Grid for Quota Sampling of Voters

74

5.1. Minimizing Primacy and Recency Effect: Basic Rules

86

Boxes 6.1. Enumerator’s Introduction and Purpose of Survey

113

6.2. Statement of Informed Consent

114

Foreword Opinion polls are well-known and little understood in the Indian public life. Ever since the mid-1990s, one or the other form of an opinion poll is a regular feature of media coverage, especially during election time. Surveys, elections, and forecasting have got so fused that every survey is assumed to be related to elections and every election-related survey is assumed to be an exercise in predicting electoral outcome. Exit polls, one special category of electionrelated surveys geared mainly for the purpose of forecasting, have come to be the generic name for opinion polls in our country. Exit polls appear to have a black magic-like quality in our public life, inviting awe, fear, and suspicion on the one hand and envy, outrage, and ridicule on the other. What unites all these opposite reactions is methodological illiteracy about opinion polls. That is why Measuring Voting Behaviour in India is such a valuable contribution to Indian public life. This methodological illiteracy is not confined to the layman. Three special segments—politicians, media persons, and academics—each crucial to dissemination and reception of opinion polls, partake of this phenomenon in their own special way. Indian politicians are not short of education or intelligence, but they are yet to discover intelligent ways of coming to terms with election-related polls. It is no secret that most political parties routinely commission market research companies to carry out pre-election opinion polls. Of late, many leaders, mostly younger ones with some Western education, have privately started using polls in their constituency to track the public mood. But this is mostly like consulting

x

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

a fortune teller; there are very few instances of sophisticated use of opinion polls to design and monitor political campaigns in India. In the public domain, Indian politicians like to quarrel with numbers and try to get away with easy rhetoric of suspicion. Most politicians have come to regard opinion polls in the public domain as a nuisance. Of late, some of them have mooted the idea of a blanket ban on election-related opinion polls and, unfortunately, the Election Commission appears willing to oblige with a recommendation to this effect. The Indian media has a love–hate relationship with opinion polls. Media managers love the spectacle of an opinion poll; serious journalists on the ground hold polls of all kinds in contempt. Part of this unease is due to absence of a clear division of intellectual labour between pollsters and journalists. In most Western democracies, opinion polls measure the level of popularity of various candidates and parties, while the journalists offer explanations for these trends and fill in color of the election campaign. Indian journalists carry the burden of understanding the micro picture of the area where they work or travel as well as predicting how these small pictures will add up at the macro level. The second task overlaps with that of opinion polls and leads to some kind of a turf war between journalists and pollsters. Journalists are happy to recount instances when they, and not the polls, got it right. Pollsters point out this as an exception rather than the rule. A good deal of this unease is due to the unprofessional ways in which opinion polls are carried out and presented. Media houses like to showcase their polls but they do not like to spend much on these; hence the proliferation of sub standard or fictitious polls. The problem is compounded by the manner in which polls are presented, especially on television: methodological details about surveys are rarely shared with the viewers, conversion of votes into seats remains a black-box, rarely do channels carry out an audit of their performance, and yet television channels confront politicians with exit poll findings as if they were the final result. The problem is not just with the anchor, the editor, or the manager who understands what opinion polls are all about; they are still something of an exception.



Foreword

xi

Finally, and most unexpectedly, the academic discipline of political science often exhibits little appreciation for public opinion research. A peculiar trajectory of the discipline in India, which need not detain us here, has meant that an average student of political science does not receive any rigorous training in survey methods or analysis of quantitative data. Most teachers and even scholars in the discipline find themselves ill-equipped to interpret or critique survey data in an informed manner and often give in to the temptation of making a virtue of it. An otherwise serious philosophic critique of “scientific” claims of social and political analysis has served in India as a gloss for sidestepping any kind of evidencebased understanding of politics. It is not uncommon for researchers in political science to make sweeping generalizations about popular perceptions without offering any systematic evidence, or use data to decorate conclusions arrived at independently. Those who do rely upon survey data-based evidence are usually seen as lower species of academics. This holds true for Indian sociology as well. Thus, an academic understanding of politics shares in turn contributes to the widespread public culture of uninformed suspicion about public opinion research. Across these three segments, the suspicion and hostility to survey-based research on political opinions, attitudes, and behavior are rooted in ignorance. The authors of this book as well as the author of this foreword belong to a small group of academics who have worked together for nearly two decades to correct this bias. Measuring Voting Behaviour in India is both an outcome of and a vital input into this counter-move to equip students of politics to carry out evidence-based research. There are many good introductory books to survey methods in political analysis. But all these books are written for students in Western academia and assume the context of North American or European politics. This book is different. Written at a time when surveys and opinion polls are increasingly being deployed in India to determine different aspects of socioeconomic and political changes, the opening chapters of the book familiarize the reader with the tradition of and the types of surveys that have been

xii

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

undertaken to measure political changes in India. With a special focus on measuring voting behavior, the subsequent chapters deploy a comparative approach by discussing methods used in countries which have a longer tradition of measuring voting behavior and identifying similarities and differences with India. The Indian context is woven into the book, rather than added on to it. It seeks to address the needs of Indian students. So far, empirical work on voting behavior in India has rarely gone beyond analyzing particular elections, with little or no attention paid to methodology. One of the main aims of this book is to educate the reader about the various tools and resources available for measuring voting behavior in any election. There is also an attempt to provide the reader with the practical skills one needs to carry out surveys of voting behavior—from sampling and designing of questionnaires to the act of data collection, the various ways of analyzing and reporting voting behavior, and the limitations in measuring voting behavior. In doing so, the authors keep in mind the level of background understanding that can be expected of an Indian student. In this sense, this is the first book that seeks to introduce survey methods in political analysis to an Indian student. It does so in a systematic manner. The first chapter introduces the concept of voting behavior and discusses the reasons for measuring it. Comparisons are made with the idea of “measurement” used in other disciplines and the different approaches to measuring voting behavior itself are discussed. This chapter also answers the basic question of why we need surveys on elections when we have the official results. It establishes the necessity of conducting surveys, given the limitations associated with aggregate data in determining individual voting preferences. The second chapter gives a historical overview of studies and surveys related to voting behavior. It discusses some of the earlier studies on voting in India and traces the growth trajectory of election-related polling in India. It brings out the ways in which the methods adopted for measuring voting behavior in India were not merely a copy from Western practices and should be seen as a creative adaptation, keeping in view India’s diverse reality. It traces the various stages through



Foreword

xiii

which election surveys and opinion polls have evolved and why this method is preferred over case studies and ethnography. From the third chapter, the book goes about its main task of methodological introduction. This chapter introduces and evaluates the different types of survey methods such as pre-election surveys, post-poll survey, or exit polls. After discussing the merits and demerits of each of these, the authors go into which of these is methodologically more robust. The fourth chapter looks at the issue of sampling, drawing upon the experience of election studies as carried out by the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS). It explains, step by step, the logic of multistage stratified random sampling and addresses issues of the representativeness of the sample. Chapter five is a comprehensive guide on questionnaire design: the different ways of structuring questionnaires, the different types of questions that can be asked, the pitfalls in question formulation, pre-testing of the questionnaire and evaluation of questionnaires. The next chapter looks at the issue of data collection and the training of investigators. Based on the best practices and protocols that are followed by polling organization for election surveys, it lays down some thumb rules that should be followed both before and during the interview process. The last two chapters tie all this to the challenge of measuring voting behavior. Chapter seven takes up the processing, analyzing, and reporting of survey findings. It identifies and establishes the need to report some essential methodological and technical information that must be reported along with the main findings of the survey. Instead of rushing into banning election-related surveys, the skeptics of polling would do well to pay attention to these recommendations made by the authors. If these disclosures are made mandatory, it might obviate the need for any ill-thought ban on surveys. The final chapter discusses some of the challenges that have faced the measurement of voting behavior in India while raising some issues that could have an effect on future surveys. The main author of this book has been involved in carrying out hundreds of election-related surveys and other opinion polls in the last two decades. He has directed more than one round of National

xiv

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

Election Study, the largest academic survey of voting behavior all over the world. He has a wide-ranging experience of explaining survey findings to academics as well as to the popular audience, through papers in journals, popular articles, and television appearances. Though not a teacher in a university, over the last few years he has been teaching extensively in training workshops, refresher courses, and of course classrooms. He thus bridges a divide between those who teach methodology and those who practice that method in the field. That is what makes this book such a valuable resource for students and teachers of political science, budding pollsters, survey investigators, trainers, and for any citizen interested in making sense of Indian elections. Christmas 2012

Yogendra Yadav Senior Fellow, Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, New Delhi

Preface Regular elections are the lifeline in any democracy. This is true in the case of India as well, where elections are held quite regularly. Being a federal form of government where elections are held not only for electing the national parliament but also for electing state assemblies, elections would take place in one state or the other almost every year. These elections result in massive participation of the people in the electoral process, more so in the voting process. A higher turnout in state assembly elections held in recent years indicates greater participation of people in Indian elections. The increasing electoral participation is also an indicator of growing interest of people in politics now compared to the past. Greater interest of people in electoral politics has resulted in people being more curious about questions like who is likely to win elections, who is likely to vote for whom, what may be the issues on which people are likely to vote in a particular election, and various related issues. Though people are interested in who votes for whom, more than people, it is the media, politicians, and political parties who are more interested in advance information on who is likely to win elections. Election surveys are scientific methods of answering if not all, but to a great extent many such questions. Though election surveys are more than merely predicting the likely outcome of elections, in recent times election surveys are increasingly being used as a mere tool of forecasting election results. The common understanding is forecasting an election is anybody’s and everybody’s game since there is hardly anything scientific about this. The book tries to focus on and inform readers that designing,

xvi

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

conducting, analyzing, and forecasting election surveys may not be as scientific as natural science, but there is a method involved in conducting election surveys and forecasting elections that is possible. It is as scientific as social science could be, with various inherent limitations of analyzing human behavior, opinion, and attitudes. The first-past-the-post electoral system, nature of coalition politics, and electoral competition add to the challenges of forecasting elections even with one of the most reliable survey data. With increasing popularity of electronic media along with the growth of English and vernacular print media and their passion for reporting opinion polls and exit polls along with other electionrelated news, the last couple of decades in India have witnessed an increasing number of opinion and exit polls. One gets an impression that opinion polls are a new thing in India, but there is a long history of conducting election analysis/election studies which dates back to Sirsikar’s study of the Poona Lok Sabha constituency in the year 1967. This was followed by a large-scale election survey of the electorate by the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS) in the same year, marking the beginning of measuring voting behavior and attitudes in India. The historical overview of election surveys provides a key insight and perspectives about the development and growth trajectory of opinion polls in India and this book is a useful guide for knowing more about the history of election surveys in India. The mention of election surveys immediately brings to the mind of the people opinion polls and exit polls typically conducted either before elections or on the day of elections which become the headline of both print and electronic media in the name of the election forecast. While for common people the only interest is about who is likely to win elections, for political analysts and pollsters it is more than just predicting numbers, it is also about a deeper analysis of elections like who voted for whom, how did the vote swing from one party to another, was development an issue, did anti-incumbency affect the ruling party or not. All these could be explained in greater detail and with greater accuracy with the



Preface

xvii

help of post-poll survey data rather than any exit poll or pre-poll survey. The book explains in detail that election surveys are not merely exit polls, they are more than that. The book addresses the core questions of how to conduct election surveys, whether opinion polls, exit polls, or post-polls are a scientific exercise, rather than being simply the guess work of some people or a mere collection of views or opinion of some voters. Opinion polls are normally not conducted in all constituencies. While there is no harm in conducting surveys in all constituencies, it is practically impossible to do that. Opinion polls or exit polls are conducted in a select sample of constituencies at sampled locations with few selected/sampled voters. In order to conduct a reliable election survey, one needs to collect data from a scientifically selected sample of voters which is representative of all the voters. While one keeps calling every sample a random sample, the book explains in detail the issue of why it is important to collect the data from a representative sample of voters and how one can select a representative sample of a small number of voters from several crore voters who may be geographically spread nationally or in one state. The book also introduces the reader to various other sampling methods which are useful for sample selection for conducting different types of election surveys. A survey of a representative sample of voters does not guarantee an accurate seat forecast. One needs to use a carefully designed questionnaire for the collection of information from the voters. The questionnaire design involves a lot of deliberations, discussion, and pre-testing; it is not merely putting down a few lines and reading out those lines by way of asking questions to the voters. The book is an eye opener and a useful guide for those who want to know more about the art of questionnaire designing and about data collection. Data collection by way of conducting field work is a challenge. The challenge of data collection is due to enormous social, religious, linguistic, and geographical diversity. Different situations demand flexibility in the method of data collection without losing out on the basic method of data collection which is standardization. Sensitive questions which people may not be

xviii

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

willing to answer in the open or in the presence of others need to be asked with utmost care, the voting question being a good example. Challenges of field work and the possible ways to handle such situations can only be understood if one has done field work on one’s own, but the description of the field work situation in this book brings a person very close to the real situation. The challenge of making an accurate seat forecast or predicating elections does not end here. Even with a fairly reliable survey, one could make an error in converting vote estimates into seats, which in common parlance is referred to as seat forecast. The survey gives us an estimate of the vote share, which is converted into seats using statistical tools or models. Different pollsters use different predictive models and every model has its own strength and weakness. The difficulty of the workability of any model is compounded by the first-past-the post electoral system where victory or defeat could be decided by one vote or by a much bigger margin. Various predictive models which have been used for converting seat forecasts fail to account for marginal victories or “surplus votes” or “wasted votes”—in case of very big victories. Even though somewhat technical, an effort has been made to familiarize the reader with various predictive models as far as possible, in a simple language. The frequent splits and mergers of political parties and the changing nature of coalition between two elections add to the problem of adjusting the vote share of the party in the previous election complicating the method of seat forecasting. Needless to say, the challenges do not end at this point. The surveys, polls, analysis and forecasting, etc., are processes of continuous learning and we are still learning and trying to make them as accurate as possible. Since no classroom teaching can help us better understand this complex issue of polls, prediction, and forecast as compared to the hands-on experience of doing this, various surveys and polls conducted at the CSDS during election helped us in gaining more and more experience of opinion poll. Both of us studied in the same college (Ramjas College, University of Delhi, though different disciplines) and have been interested in elections from the



Preface

xix

college days, never went to any formal institution for training in survey, polls, and prediction, but during our long association with CSDS, used the institution as a laboratory to gain practical knowledge on this subject. We can say for sure that no formal training would substitute the learning we received through handson experience of working on surveys, polls, and analyses at CSDS. The 1998 Lok Sabha elections gave us the real opportunity for a comprehensive understanding of the entire exercise of polls and prediction when I (Sanjay Kumar) took charge of the National Election Study 1998, as National Coordinator, and was aptly supported by the team which included Praveen Rai along with others. We never looked back from the journey we began during the 1998 Lok Sabha elections and kept working together on various other National Election Studies which helped us in gaining more and more experience and confidence which ultimately resulted in writing this book together. But we must confess this long journey may not have been possible without the confidence and support we received from our senior colleagues at CSDS, especially V.B. Singh, D.L. Sheth, and Yogendra Yadav. The directors of CSDS at various points of time, V.B. Singh, R.K. Srivastava, Suresh Sharma, and Rajeev Bhargava, provided us the opportunity to work independently which helped us complete this book more or less on time. We express our gratitude to Suhas Palshikar who always encouraged us to write this book. We would like to express our thanks to Banasmita Bora and Dhanajay Kumar Singh, our colleagues at Lokniti, Program for Comparative Democracy, who provided various administrative and logistic support whenever we needed. We would also like to thank Sohini Mukherjee and Sunita Kambhampati who helped us in revising the manuscript. The credit of encouraging us to write this book goes to Ashok Chandran, who came to our office when he was working with SAGE and informed us about the proposed series which SAGE wanted to come up with on measuring and invited us to write the first book of the series on Measuring Voting Behaviour. We gladly accepted his invitation since both of us were already working on more or less similar topics and decided to

xx

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

choose SAGE as our publisher. Thanks are due to all those who worked on this book in different capacities at SAGE. Both of us would like to specially thank our family members who always provided encouragement not only at every stage of writing this book but also for each and every survey/poll which we conducted, and were widely reported in the national media. They always felt happy when the surveys were appreciated and shared the moments of sadness when some surveys went off the mark. Finally, both of us would like to dedicate this book to our respective fathers, who not only took keen interest in elections but also watched with interest all the news related to our surveys on television and also read all the survey findings which were published in the newspaper/magazines. They would have been extremely happy to see this book coming out after years of our committed work, but unfortunately we both lost our fathers a few years back. We would certainly miss them when we organize the event for the formal launch of this book, but their inspiration would certainly motivate us to plan to write another book. Sanjay Kumar Praveen Rai

1 Measuring Voting Behaviour and Attitudes

The term “measuring voting behavior and attitudes” of the electorates immediately brings to mind the numerous election surveys and exit polls that take place whenever elections are held in India. Opinion polls for measuring voting behavior and for making seat forecasts in electronic and print media have now become a regular feature during elections. The swing of votes and early gains and losses for political parties and candidates that are ahead in the electoral fray make newspaper headlines and bytes on television channels throughout the election period. Election surveys are conducted by media and polling organizations all over the world to measure the popular mood of the voter during the elections, to find out issues that would be crucial in the elections, the voter’s choice of political parties and leaders, and the voting intentions of the electorates. The opinion polls do an in-depth and holistic measurement of voting behavior and opinion of the electorates that include gains and losses for political parties or candidates in terms of vote share and their winnability chances in the elections. The measurement of voting behavior in the broad framework means approximation of the electorate’s opinion and views on various facets of electoral competition in numerical terms based on a sample survey of registered voters. The opinion and attitudes of the voters are gathered through empirical research and are quantified or translated into figures to provide a macro-view generalization

2

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

about electoral trends and patterns in the elections. A sample survey is done to collect data on the electoral behavior of the voters that is representative and mirrors reflection of the opinion and views of the total electorate. The data collected through empirical research are used along with the available secondary data on elections to compute voting behavior and attitudes. The term “measuring voting behavior and attitudes” has different connotations for different academic disciplines and the method and determinants they use to probe them are also different from each other. There are several approaches used by social science disciplines for measuring voting behavior like sociological, political, ecological or aggregate statistical, sociopsychological, and rational choice. Thus it becomes pertinent to deliberate and discuss the different connotations of the term “voting behavior” and find out whether these disciplines use completely different measurement approaches or whether they share some common variables of probe and draw from each other in their research methods. The interpretation of the term “voting behavior” and the different approaches in measuring voting behavior and attitudes of the voters will help in understanding the nuances and finer aspects of the various methods used in a comparative framework. The origin of the study and statistical analysis of elections can be located within the discipline of political science which with the passage of time developed into a subdiscipline called Psephology. Psephology is the study of elections based on precinct data on voting, public opinion polls for gauging the mood of the voters, information on campaign finance and other available statistical data on elections. This raises some competing questions like why are opinion polls done to study electoral competition when secondary data on elections are available and what are the aspects of electoral behavior that is probed and analyzed by such polls. Similarly what is the purpose for measuring voting behavior and attitudes of the electorate and how are the collected data used and utilized. The answer to these posers and questions connected with it will be elaborately discussed and detailed in the relevant sections of this chapter.



Measuring Voting Behaviour and Attitudes

3

This chapter is divided into two sections: The first section deals with the meaning of the term “measurement” as used by physical and life sciences and what it means for election studies. It tries to find out how voting behavior can be measured and what are the scales used for computing them. It discusses whether the measurement of behavior, opinion, and views of the electorate can be done with similar accuracy as measurements of phenomena are done in various disciplines of pure and applied sciences. This section figures out the aspects of voting behavior and attitudes that are usually computed by popular opinion polls in India. It enumerates the different connotations of the term voting behavior and approaches adopted for measuring it by various disciplines of social science. This section also focuses on different kinds of variables and probes that are used for measuring voting behavior and the interdisciplinary sharing of domain knowledge and research methods. The focus in the second section will be on the reasons why opinion polls are conducted to compute the voting behavior and attitudes of the electorates during the elections. It explains the purpose of measuring voting behavior based on voters’ opinion and feedback and how it helps in understanding and statistically analyzing the voting patterns and trends in elections. This section also deals with the reasons for conducting opinion poll-based election studies in India and highlights how the probes are different from the background variables that are used for research by opinion polls conducted in other parts of the globe.

Voting Behavior—Different Connotations and Approaches The term “measurement” in physical and life sciences is defined as the approximation or estimation of ratios of quantities that can be determined with a degree of precision. Thus entities like length, height, weight, heartbeat, blood pressure, etc., can be quantified and measured with high levels of accuracy. Quantification and measurement in science are mutually defined as “quantitative

4

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

attributes are those that can be measured in some predefined units and stated in figures.” Accurate measurement is essential in many fields of study and all measurements are necessarily approximations of the phenomena and events with the maximum levels of accuracy that is humanly possible. Like in physical or life science disciplines, election studies also try to scientifically measure the voting behavior and attitudes of the electorates in quantitative terms with high levels of accuracy. However, election studies measure voting behavior and attitudes that are hypothetical or surreal unlike physical sciences that measure entities that are real and tangible. Behavior and attitudes are intangible entities that are constructed to ascertain the response tendencies of a group and cannot be measured as exactly and precisely as entities that are measured in the disciplines of science. The voting behavior and attitude comprise of views and orientations of the voters that represent the majority characteristics of the total electorates. Thus election studies measure the voting behavior and attitude of a sample of voters quantitatively to make generalizations or inferences for the total electorates. Thus voting behavior and attitudes can be measured in quantitative terms with a fair amount of accuracy using various scientific scaling options but not as precisely as it is done in physical and life sciences. This contention is reiterated by Yogendra Yadav, one of the leading political analysts in India, who feels “psephology is not a discipline, a science like microbiology is. Psephology is nothing more than election studies” (Indian Express, Sunday, January 27, 2008). This raises the question how voting behavior and attitudes are commonly measured and the kind of scales that are used for measuring them in quantitative terms. There are various research methods for studying the voting behavior of the electorates like sample survey, case study, and participation observatory study. However, case studies and observation studies do not use quantitative methods for studying elections, so voting behavior cannot be measured in certain terms. Thus a sample survey of the electorate remains the most commonly used method for measurement of voting behavior as it generates quantitative data for analysis and



Measuring Voting Behaviour and Attitudes

5

drawing inferences. For measurement of voting behavior and attitudes, the questions used in opinion polls have answer variables that are assigned mathematical values or numerical codes. There are different measurement scales that are used for quantifying the responses and the choice of a scale to be used for a particular question depends upon what the question intends to probe. The scale that is quite often used in election surveys is the nominal scale in which a numerical value is assigned to each category of response to differentiate them from each other. For example, all the states and union territories in India can be classified under this scale by assigning different numerals that can be used for identification of the names of the states while analyzing the data. Another scale that is most commonly used in election studies is the ordinal scale as it helps in ranking or prioritization of voter’s response. Thus questions like voters’ choice of leaders, issues that are most important have ordinal scales for ranking them. They are ranked as first, second, third, and so on, depending upon the opinion and assessment of the voters. The ordinal scale can bring out, who has more or less an attribute of an ideal political leader but not how much more or less from being an ideal leader. For this an interval scale is used as it reveals the degree of difference between two leaders on the attributes of being an ideal leader. Thus the interval scale is an improvement over the ordinal scale and brings out the comparative differences more sharply and clearly. Another scale that is used for measuring voting behavior and attitudes is the Likert scale. In this scale, voters are asked to respond on a battery of statements in the “agree” and “disagree” format with the answer options of strongly agree, agree, disagree, or strongly disagree. Apart from the measurement scales as discussed, there are large numbers of measurement scales that are used for computing the behavior and attitudes in sample surveys but these are the scales that are more often used in opinion polls on elections. The phrase “voting behavior” connotes more than just an examination of voting records, a compilation of voting statistics, and a computation of electoral shifts. It means analysis of individual psychological processes like perception, emotion, and motivation

6

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

and their relation to the vote decision of group structures and functions and their relation to political action, as well as of institutional patterns, such as the communication process, and their impact on elections (Eldersveld, 1951). Voting behavior and attitudes include the analysis of the voting intentions of the voters, whom they would vote for or have voted for, what are the considerations of the voting, issues that have an impact on their voting decisions, voters’ satisfaction levels with the performance of the government, and the popularity ratings of leadership and the ruling party. It also includes the participatory norms of the voters and their levels of participation in the elections. The terms “political behavior” and “voting behavior” to most political and social scientists are not meant to suggest a behavior study which is essentially different in a conceptual sense from many other types of studies. What is different in studying political behavior or voting behavior is not the principle of behavior, or the content of behavior, but rather the context in which the individual’s behavior is being examined; namely, the context of governmental institutions (Eldersveld, 1951). The term “measuring voting behavior and attitudes” has different connotations for different academic disciplines and the factors/variables that they probe and compute are also different from each other. The sociological or social contextual approach refers to the social setting in which individuals or voters function and their voting behavior is affected by it ( Johnson et al., 1999). “Contextual theories of politics are built on an assertion of behavioral interdependence: the actions of individual citizens are to be understood as the intersection between individually defined circumstances” (Huckfeldt and Sprague, 1993: 281). In this regard, individual behavior is contingent upon the environment created by the aggregation of individual traits. “A theory is contextual when variation in some aggregated individual trait (mean income, percent white, etc.) produces variation in an observed individual behavior among individuals who share the aggregate trait” (Huckfeldt and Sprague, 1993: 281). Sprague refers to this condition as “social resonance” since the underlying intuition is “one of reinforcement of



Measuring Voting Behaviour and Attitudes

7

a property possessed by individual through repeatedly encountering the same property in the environment” (Sprague, 1982: 101). The sociological approach for measuring voting behavior uses socioeconomic variables like class, occupation, ethnicity, sex, and age for determining the support of electorates for political parties and candidates and finding correlations. The focus of this approach is on the correlations between the voters and the social settings, voting intentions in the social context, and examines the effects on the voting behavior of variables such as caste communities, socioeconomic class, language, religion, and rural–urban divides. On the other hand, the discipline of political science computes voting behavior using political factors such as electoral issues, political programs, electoral campaigns, and the popularity of political parties and leaders based on the opinion and attitudes of the voters. The focus of political science enquiry in election studies has focused on three main areas: the structure and motivations of the electorate, the operation and effect of the party and the election system, and the impact of social and political institutions on voting behavior. Political theorists are concerned with understanding the political community and the political animal, and to understand them eventually by means of precise and general statements (Eldersveld, 1951). The measurement of voting behavior and attitudes by the political science discipline has not produced conclusions or patterns that can be theorized at the broad level but have been successful in explaining the political behavior of the electorates in definitive terms. Apart from these two common approaches, there are other methods of election studies like ecological or aggregate statistical approach and rational choice approaches for measuring voting behavior and attitudes. The ecological or aggregate statistical approach finds out the correlation of voting patterns and trends with the characteristic features of a geographical area like the ward or village panchayat, constituency, and the state. The rational choice or the institutional context approach attempts to explain voting behavior as the outcome of a series of instrumental cost benefit calculations by the individual, assessing

8

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

the relative desirability of specific electoral outcomes in terms of the issues addressed and policies espoused by the different parties or candidates. The institutional context refers to specific institutional structures, rules, and procedures that formally or informally define relationships among individuals and in turn influence individual behavior. The electoral rules governing the aggregation of votes, the method of representation, and the scope of the franchise have been found to directly and substantially influence the outcome of elections and the behavior and attitudes of individual voters ( Johnson et al., 1999). Election studies following this approach measure the opinion and views of the electorate on different institutions and provide a straightforward explanation for how electoral rules and regulation influence the choices of individual voters and electoral outcomes. The outcome resulting from the game depends upon the set of feasible outcomes, individual preference, and the rules that govern the game (Plott, 1978). The rules are taken to be external to individual behavior and the level of measuring institutional rules is solely determined by the unit and level of analysis of the election research. The various social science approaches for measuring voting behavior and attitudes of the electorates have in recent times witnessed an interdisciplinary exchange of variables that were earlier considered exclusive and distinct for each approach. Thus variables like caste, community, religion, and socioeconomic class were earlier used only by the sociologists but these variables are now quite frequently used by political theorists in democratic countries for measuring the voting behavior and attitudes of the electorate.

Why We Measure Voting Behavior Voting in elections is the most visible form of political participation in democratic countries and scholars and researchers all over the world try to measure the voting behavior and attitudes of the electorates. The overall purpose of election studies is to find out the voting patterns and trends based on the opinion and attitudes



Measuring Voting Behaviour and Attitudes

9

of the voters. The purpose of election studies is not only to present a narrative account of various events that take place during elections but also to scientifically identify and explain the recurring causal dynamics underlying the particular events of that election based on voters’ opinion and feedback. The data of voting process available with election bodies provided the impetus to the psephologists to collect further electoral data through opinion polls for measuring the voting behavior and attitudes of voters. The reasons for measuring voting behavior is manifold, but the main focus is to understand the voting patterns in elections, by probing key issues like why people vote or do not vote, how they arrive at voting decisions and questions connected with voters’ engagement and participation in the elections. The elections are studied and examined primarily through the prism of voters. What does and does not influence voters is ascertained by comparing the behavior and attitudes of one group of voters at a particular election with that of another group at the same election. It is assumed that if we can understand what accounts for differences between voters at an election, we can understand what accounts for the outcome and key characteristics of elections as a whole (Curtice, 2000). One of the key purposes of election studies is to find the swing in elections which is the average gain of winning parties and the average loss by losing parties as expressed in terms of their percentages of all the votes cast at the aggregate and disaggregate levels. The swing of votes helps in explaining the election verdict in two ways: (a) the general measure of the degree of movement of popular electoral support in favor of the main winning parties and (b) in systematically measuring the relationship between a party’s gain or loss in popular votes and its gain or loss in the number of seats won or lost. Sample surveys for measuring voting behavior over a span of time provide time series data of successive elections that are used in comparative analysis of voting behavior and attitudes and in revealing the changing electoral patterns and trends. Election studies have introduced time into their designs either by deploying a pre/post-poll design survey in which the same group of voters is interviewed both before and after the polling day or by

10

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

an inter-election panel design in which voters interviewed at the last election are contacted again at the next one and interviewed (Curtice and Semetko, 1994; Miller and Shanks, 1996). While potentially panel design is subject to problems of conditioning and attrition, these panel designs also have the advantage that they reduce our reliance on the respondent’s memory of past attitudes or behavior, thereby giving us, for example, more reliable estimates of the volatility of voting behavior (Himmelweit et al., 1978). The purpose of measuring voting behavior and the aspects of elections probed in India is almost the same as it is in other countries of the world with some peculiarities that are specific to a country. Before we embark on the need for conducting surveybased election studies in India, it would be pertinent to find out what is the official election-related information and kind of data that is available and since when it is archived in the Election Commission of India (ECI). The Election Commission of India houses the election results and data of all general elections and state assembly elections held in India since independence. The data are in the public domain and the electronic copies of it are available on their official website. The kind of information available at ECI are: (a) the number of people who voted in Parliamentary or Assembly elections that is termed as Voter Turnout; (b) the list of candidates who contested the elections at the national/state level, the winner, the runner up, and the percentage of votes polled by all the candidates; (c) the number of political parties that contested the elections and the votes polled by them. It also provides the number of candidates fielded by parties and the number of candidates that won; (d ) data on the gender break up of candidates who contested and won the elections. It also provides information about the scheduled castes (SC) and scheduled tribe (ST) status of candidates elected in a particular election and (e) it also archives the affidavits filed by the candidates who contest elections containing particulars like judicial cases filed against them, property held by them, and other personal information for public scrutiny.



Measuring Voting Behaviour and Attitudes

11

The information available at ECI provides the factual information of voting processes in elections and the detailed aggregate results in quantitative terms. However, it does not provide any data about the voting behavior and attitudes of the electorates like how people from different socioeconomic and caste communities voted in the election, whom they voted for or did not vote for and why they voted for a particular party or candidate. Did the young voter have different political preferences compared to the old? Are most women voters guided by their husbands in taking their voting decisions? Which election issue dominated the mind of the voters during a particular election? There are numerous questions of such kind, which can’t be answered from the results/data available from the ECI. The available information cannot answer questions related with elections like: Do Muslims in India vote for the right wing political party BJP or do they vote en bloc and strategically vote to defeat the party in elections? Forward castes are considered to be traditional supporters of national parties like Congress or BJP always vote for them or do they vote for regional parties also in some states? What have been the voting patterns of voters from communities like Dalits and Adivasis in India? Has the emergence of parties based on scheduled castes/tribal identities led to the consolidation of scheduled castes/tribal votes in their favor? What is the support base of political parties at the national level and in different states of India and what does their profile of voters look like? Do electoral choices amongst voters, from different background (educated/illiterates, rural/urban, and rich/poor) vary significantly? The study of behavioral or contextual aspects of voting in Indian elections becomes important and relevant as answers to these can be found in an evidenced manner by conducting empirical election studies. An attempt to answer these questions without any evidence would be conjectural or impressionistic and can be far removed from the actual truth. The National Election Study series based on post-poll surveys conducted by the Lokniti, Programme for Comparative Democracy at the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, is the largest

12

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

and the most comprehensive social scientific survey of Indian General Elections and perhaps of any election in the world. The NES series not only is a study of voting behavior of the Indian electorate but also gathers the most robust information about how Indians voted in the various national elections. The NES treats elections as a window to capture the most accurate snapshot of the political behavior, attitudes, and opinion of the Indian voters. The last NES conducted in 2009 also explored the awareness levels and opinion of the Indian citizens on issues concerning the Indian economy, national security, democracy, and diversity. The National Election Study is the most comprehensive information database of social and political change in India and has been used as a source for international comparative studies. The purpose of conducting election surveys in India is to measure voting patterns and trends of the electorate, their electoral preferences and choices, issues that voters considered important, and the reasons for their participation or nonparticipation in elections. It helps in gathering detailed and comprehensive information about the behavioral aspects of voters in elections. Thus election surveys are much more than just finding out the vote share assessment of political parties and seat forecasting, as it is popularly perceived.

2 A Historical Overview of Election Studies in India

Election surveys conducted to measure the voting behavior of Indians and quantifying their political opinion and attitudes have become very popular in India in recent times. The large number of opinion poll surveys conducted among the Indian electorates during the elections held in the last one decade is a testimony to the fact of growing popularity of election surveys and the polling industry in the country. The last two general elections held in the year 2004 and 2009 witnessed a fierce competition in the Indian media for conducting pre-poll surveys and exit polls. Though the race between the media is finally for making as accurate as possible a predication about election results, or the most accurate seat forecast as to which party is going to win the election and how many seats the major political establishments would win, this race is accompanied with a race of bigger and bigger sample and quicker dissemination of the findings for consumption among its viewers/ readers. Apart from revealing the voting intentions of the Indian electorate, the findings on the opinion and attitudes of voters and their electoral behavior were also widely reported. The byline/title of pre-poll survey results in media during the general elections held in 2009 not only were political like “UPA ahead in race, but would fail to reach the majority mark,” “Advantage UPA, NDA slightly behind” but also reflected the voting behavior of the sections of society like “Youth vote will decide the political fortunes

14

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

of parties.” Pollsters and election analysts not only donned the role of Nostradamus in predicting how many seats political alliances like UPA, NDA, the Left Front, and others would get in the elections but were also busy explaining the electoral behavior and attitudes of the voters and the impact of issues on the fate of the elections. In this background, it becomes pertinent to find out whether opinion polls conducted for analyzing voting behavior and attitudes along with election predictions in India are a recent phenomenon that evolved in the 21st century or do their root go back to the previous century. When did an attempt for measuring the opinion and attitudes of the voters start in India and what was the rationale and purpose behind it? Was the method adopted for measuring voting behavior in India a direct and carbon copy of the Western world or was this adapted keeping in view the diverse and heterogeneous society in India? What are the various stages which election survey and opinion polling have undergone and what are the innovations and developments that have taken place over the period of time? Why is the survey method a more popular method for measuring voting behavior in India compared to other methods like constituency studies, elite studies, case studies, or ethnography studies? This chapter addresses these questions and issues related to it in a historical perspective to provide insightful and objective answers. It is divided into three broad sections: The first section historically traces the origins and inspiration of election polling for studying voting behavior in India. It provides a glimpse of the pioneers who started election surveys in the USA and India and the hurdles faced by the Indian counterpart in conducting polls arising out of the different socio cultural settings in which they were rooted. It also reveals the interesting findings of opinion polls on Indian election and how it laid the stones for further growth and scope for building the discipline of election studies in the country. The second section provides the historical perspective when election surveys became popular with media and exit polls and pre-election surveys became the buzzword in the 1990s. It also provides its



A Historical Overview of Election Studies in India

15

growth and development trajectory as a result of media fascination and support for measuring voting behavior in India. Apart from election surveys conducted by the media, institutional academic surveys, which were discontinued in the decade of the 1980s, were also restarted during this period. The new features introduced in academic surveys during this period included large sample size, use of multi-wave surveys with panel design, and the use of dummy secret ballots and dummy ballot boxes for ascertaining the voting preference of the voters. The final section deals with other approaches used by scholars and academicians in measuring voting behavior and attitudes of the electorates like constituency studies, case studies, and ethnography studies. Constituency level studies, case studies, and ethnographic studies of electoral politics are mostly done at the localized level like few localities of constituency, village, town, or city. These studies are based on observation and local level participatory investigations. Constituency studies, case studies, and ethnographic studies of voting behavior are more qualitative in nature and done for assessing the symbolic aspects of electoral politics. How far these studies are helpful in quantitatively measuring the voting behavior and attitudes of the electorates will be discussed in detail and comprehensively analyzed in this section.

1950s: Origin of Election Survey Before tracing the origin of election surveys in India based on opinion poll, it is pertinent to track the beginning of opinion polls and election studies in the worldwide perspective. The beginning of polling started when Dr Gallup founded the American Institute of Public Opinion in Princeton, New Jersey, USA, in the year 1935. The objective of this organization was to determine the opinions held by people with objectivity and impartiality. To ensure objectivity and credibility, it was decided that no election polling would be conducted that was paid or sponsored in a covert or overt manner by the two main political parties in the USA, the

16

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

Republican and Democratic. The first prediction made by Gallup that Franklin Roosevelt would defeat Alfred Landon for the “Gallup Polls” is best known for its accuracy in predicting the election outcome of US presidential elections. The only two notable exceptions in their track record were the 1948 Thomas Dewey– Harry S. Truman election when they wrongly predicted like other pollsters that Dewey will win, but he actually lost. The second inaccurate prediction was in 1976 when Gallup Poll indicated that Gerald Ford would win, but he actually lost to Jimmy Carter by a small margin. Gallup opinion polls on US presidential elections not only predict the winners and losers of the elections but also provide a comprehensive and detailed account of the voting behavior of the US electorate. The beginning of election surveys in India is not a recent phenomenon but goes back to the 1950s when the first institutional opinion poll was conducted to measure the opinion and attitudes of Indian voters. Dr Eric da Costa—the founder of the Indian Institute of Public Opinion (IIPO) in the early 1950s, which was modeled on the American Institute of Public Opinion—is credited with pioneering election studies and is considered the father of opinion polling in India. An economist by training whose primary interest was on consumer-related studies also started public opinion polls on economic and political issues in India. The IIPO conducted a group of political studies in Delhi, West Bengal, and Kerala, the results of which were published in the first issue of the Institute’s journal Monthly Public Opinion Studies (MPOS) in 1955 paving the way for conducting election surveys. The IIPO was the first organization in India to conduct an election survey. In 1957, the first all India level election poll was conducted before the Second Lok Sabha Election. Based on this survey, the first election prediction was done which was quite accurate. The survey focused on studying the voting behavior of Indians and revealing how voting intention varies with income, religion, and the occupational background of voters. The survey also tried to find out the popularity ratings of political leaders and an index of popularity of party leaders was also reported. Thus the focus of the IIPO



A Historical Overview of Election Studies in India

17

election surveys was on finding out the voting intentions and its variations based on caste, community, dominant political issues in the country, leadership ratings, etc. Eric da Costa reviewing the operations of IIPO in 1980 said: it was not known at that time whether in fact an All India poll was truly feasible. The obstacles of illiteracy and the difficulties of organizing random samples in many areas of the Indian Union seemed overwhelming. The fact that the experiment was an extraordinary success was not proved until the first National Poll was published in 1957.

The IIPO not only conducted the first all-India poll but also started predicting election results. da Costa said: it was then seen for the first time that the great power of public opinion research abroad in predicting voting intentions and results, as well as opinions on a variety of sensitive subjects applied to India and was revealed almost as a new Indian discovery.

Thus the IIPO conducted election surveys till 1980s, but after the exit of Dr Costa, opinion polling on elections did not figure high on the agenda of the organization and it was discontinued. Apart from IIPO, another notable study during the 1950s was done by S.V. Kogekar and Richard Park who published their findings in the Report on the Indian General Elections. Studies at this time were mainly descriptive and generic in nature and Kogekar and Park’s study was no exception (Narain, 1978). Their research was a state-wise study of the Indian electoral processes and covered topics such as patterns of party alliances, selection of candidates, role of the press, and a summary of the election results. To collect data on these topics, Kogekar and Park formulated a scheme that outlined the survey that they wanted to use in their research (Narain, 1978). This scheme was sent to political scientists in various states and they were asked to compile a report for their respective states using the information collected. It provided significant insight into the level of voters’ awareness,

18

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

party preferences, and relevance of the split vote theory (Narain 1978). However, there were aspects of the research that negatively affected the outcome of the overall study. (a) The lack of funds only allowed Kogekar and Park to devote part of their time to the study; (b) there was not comprehensive coverage between states and not many field studies were executed; (c) since Kogekar and Park asked for a report from each coordinating political scientist, these reports were not uniform in style. Lastly, not all of them were objective. However, Iqbal Narain believes that the biggest “downfall” of the Kogekar and Park study was their method and techniques used to analyze the data collected. He describes their use of the survey method and the statistical tools utilized as “elementary.” The overall contribution that Kogekar and Park’s study had was that it gave a good insight into some of the socioeconomic forces that influenced voting behavior and highlighted the importance of studying politics at a state level to gain an understanding of politics at the national level. Other individuals also forayed into election studies with V.M. Sirsikar studying the Poona Lok Sabha constituency based on a sample survey during the general elections held in 1967. The study brought out some interesting points about democracy, elections, and voters’ political preference and behavior at the micro-level of parliamentary constituency. The findings were: (a) the majority of people in India had faith in democracy, elections, and political parties. However, the faith in democracy and its processes had a direct correlation with educational attainments of the voters. Those with higher educational qualifications had lesser faith in democracy as compared with those having lower exposure to education; (b) the Congress party was the most preferred choice of voters among the minority groups based on caste communities; (c) among families in the lower educational bracket, the head of the family had a larger influence in the voting decisions of the family members as compared with families with higher education; (d ) the candidate, party, and caste community were the important consideration for forming voting decisions; and (e) the occupational, income, and



A Historical Overview of Election Studies in India

19

age of voters do not influence the voting behavior and attitudes of voters. During the general elections held in 1967, at the individual level, Kini conducted a panel survey using a detailed interview schedule in Nagpur. He used the “split vote” technique to find out the respondents’ preference of parties in the Lok Sabha elections and state assembly elections. Though the sample was small like the Poona study, it brought out important findings about elections and the voting behavior of the electorates. It brought to light that the consideration for voting for the Congress party was on the issue of strong leadership and national and local issues did not matter to the voters in forming voting decisions. The study also brought forth an important aspect of electoral behavior as voters exposed to election campaigns and party propaganda were more volatile in their voting intentions and were more likely to change. Socioeconomic variables such as gender, caste, religion, education, and income were important variables in determining political awareness and efficacy. The attempts to measure the voting behavior of the electorate were carried forward by Eldersveld and Bashiruddin Ahmed as they conducted an all India survey of the general elections held in 1967 and 1971. The data collected were used to do a cross-country comparison of voting behavior and attitudes of the Indian electorate. The election study findings vindicated the findings of the Poona study that could be generalized for all India and added some new and path breaking observations about electoral behavior of voters in the country. The new observations were: (a) the voting behavior and political preferences did not differ much on locations as both rural and urban had similar opinions. On the other hand, there were differences in voting behavior and political preferences of voters state-wise; (b) the traditional supporters of left parties and Jan Sangh agreed more with the issues raised by their parties as compared with voters of other parties; and (c) participation of voters from the upper castes and those with higher educational attainments in electoral politics was lesser as compared with that of voters with lesser education and belonging to other caste communities.

20

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

Dr Shriram Maheshwari also conducted a notable study in 1977. In his book, Electoral Politics in the National Metropolis, Dr Maheshwari looked at the polling in four metropolitan constituencies in Delhi. These constituencies were Matia Mahal, Danja Ganj, Tirlokpuri, and Haus Khas. His research received funding from the Indian Council of Social Science Research and was based on surveying people from these four constituencies. He had research investigators interview people while he, himself, interviewed party candidates and influential constituents. Overall, he polled 393 people and used the survey method to collect data. Under the survey method, he used a questionnaire, which was different for candidates and voters, a schedule, participant and nonparticipant observation, and informal talks (Maheshwari, 1982). The questions asked were mainly to gain an idea of the voting behavior in these four constituencies. However, there were also personal and opinion-based questions that allowed Maheshwari to gain an understanding of the socioeconomic background and political knowledge of the surveyed voters. Dr Maheshwari also collected materials from the Metropolitan Council to get an idea of the constituencies. He tabulated the data in a simple frequency table and analyzed the data using simple statistical percentage methods. Some significant findings in his study were that people in rural areas came out to vote more than people in the urban areas, women turnout was less than men turnout, and upper-class Delhiites were “indifferent” to the political process. One person who did not use the “survey” method to study elections in India was Harry W. Blair. In his book, Voting, Caste, Community, Society: Explorations in Aggregated Data Analysis in India and Bangladesh, he focused on various constituencies in Bihar and used the technique known as Aggregate Data Analysis or Ecological Analysis (Blair, 1979). He believed aggregate data analysis to be better than the survey method because it was not reliant on the actual election year to gather data. This was because he utilized polling stations of a constituency, constituencies, or districts of a state for his data sample. The survey method relied on selecting a random sample and interviewing hundreds to thousands of people



A Historical Overview of Election Studies in India

21

(Blair, 1979). Hence, Blair had all the information he needed whenever he required it. Another reason he believed aggregate data analysis to be better is because it was cheaper to implement compared to the survey method. However, some disadvantages to this method were that the researchers were limited in their questions and analysis was only able to reveal much about the behavior of a population, but not the individual. In his book, Blair looks at various variables that could affect voting behavior. For example, in one study, Blair looks at one constituency within the Vidhan Sabha. He tried to determine how much variation in voter turnout and party vote could be accounted for by just knowing the dominant caste present at each polling station. He concluded that the dominant caste at the village level influences the voting behavior in that area a great deal (Blair, 1979). He came to this result by using a Lorenz Curve, which showed the inequality between population and representation. His use of the Lorenz Curve highlights another one of Blair’s objectives when writing his book. He wanted to introduce some new strategies for quantitative analysis of South Asian elections. As a result, Blair attempted to explain statistical methods while discussing voting behavior in Bangladesh and India. Some methods include: beginner’s level mastery of zero-order correlation and regression, and simple one-way analyses of variance (Blair, 1979). Not only did Blair shed a new light on voting behavior, he also utilized complex quantitative methods that were rarely used in South Asian election studies analysis until that time. The institutional beginning of academic study of general elections based on an all India sample survey started at the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS), Delhi, in the 1960s. The study popularly known as the National Election Study (NES) was first conducted in 1967 as a scientific study of the political behavior, opinion, and attitudes of the electorates in India. The immediate objective of NES was to map and measure the voting behavior and opinion of the Indian voter and help explain the electoral outcome. But it also had a wide range of secondary objectives that continue to be of relevance to students of democratic

22

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

politics in and outside India. The NES 1967 started the tradition of survey research at the CSDS that has sought to use elections as an occasion or a window of making sense of trends and patterns in democratic politics. The NES held in 1967 could be credited as the first survey-based national level study of political opinions and attitudes in India on a large sample. This was followed by another national level study conducted during the 1971 general elections. During the 1980 Lok Sabha elections, while the CSDS designed the all-India survey, the IIPO, Delhi, conducted the fieldwork. Although strictly not a part of the NES series, this survey can be used to partly fill the gap in the series. These election surveys could be classified as the first generation of surveys of CSDS. The surveys conducted during this period can be marked as the evolution of survey tradition at CSDS. The hallmark of surveys during this period was probability sampling, in-depth questionnaires, and rigorous fieldwork. The very first survey conducted in 1967 established the basics of the NES tradition in India as it focused on a self-weighted national probability sample, representative of all the diversities within the Indian electorate drawn on the basis of a multistage stratified random sampling. A total of 55 Lok Sabha constituencies were selected by stratifying these on the basis of party competition types. Within these sampled constituencies, assembly segments and polling station areas were selected by following the probability proportionate to size (PPS) procedure. Finally, respondents were randomly sampled from the electoral rolls of the sampled polling station areas, with strict emphasis on non-substitution. There was one major shortcoming in this survey as women voters were excluded in the NES 1967. This was because of the perceived field difficulties and the belief that there was no significant difference between the opinions of men and women voters. However, this gap was filled very soon and in NES 1971, women too were included in the sample. Though the sample size of previous studies appears smaller compared to the sample size with which the studies are done at present, it is important to remember that the sample was bigger compared to other national studies of that



A Historical Overview of Election Studies in India

23

time and was sufficient for the purpose it was designed, namely, to measure trends and patterns in political behavior and attitudes at the national level. Besides, the sample was drawn very rigorously and yielded a representative sample at the national level. One of the distinctive attributes of the surveys during this period was a combination of the cross-sectional survey with an elite survey of political opinions and attitudes carried out in 1971. Besides sampling, the NES 1967 and 1971 also established conventions of the research instrument and fieldwork. Long survey schedules with more than 250 or even 300 items involving face-to-face interaction for well over one hour characterized the research instruments of the CSDS NES. The schedules were designed with the basic orientation of understanding a wide range of political subjects and not just elections. The emphasis was on a wide range of themes of political behavior, opinions, and attitudes, with some questions on enduring values. An extensive range of background variables was used for documenting the social profile of the respondents. The surveys also began the rigorous practice of carefully translating the survey schedule into all the major languages spoken in India. The recruitment of field investigator, the training of field investigators, fieldwork, data collection and supervision of field work, all these works were directly conducted by the CSDS. During the 1980s, survey research of elections and voting behavior did not figure prominently on the centre’s intellectual agenda, nor was the series taken over by any other institution. This resulted in a long break in the time series data and it was in the mid-1990s that the CSDS revived the NES tradition and it remains one of the most prestigious academic studies of voting behavior in India. Another study done on behalf of an institution was the study conducted by Myron Weiner and John Osgood Field. They conducted several election studies for the MIT Center for International Studies. The project was called the MIT Indian Election Data Project and it was established in early 1968. They compiled their data into a book called Studies in Electoral Politics in the Indian State. Their main objective with their project was to commence a

24

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

series of computer-based studies of elections in India since 1952. They focused on the state assemblies of India, which contain more than 3,000 constituencies (Field, Osgood and Weiner, 1977). Since it was a computer analysis, Field and Weiner had to arrange the data in files, convert the concepts studied into measurements, and resolve how to compare constituencies. Inevitably, there were some technical problems that forced them to re-evaluate their goals. Thus, with all the data they were collecting, they now wanted to make sure that the data were converted into a usable form and made available to scholars in the USA and India. Additionally, they decided to conduct focused “pilot” studies that would be of interest to India area experts and individuals who were interested in electoral behavior in developing countries. These pilot studies fell into two groups: studying the relationship between electoral behavior and some aspects of modernization and examining major cleavages in Indian politics and their party and electoral manifestations (Field, Osgood and Weiner, 1977). For the first group, Field and Weiner used census and other socioeconomic data. Within this group, they also studied how national electoral trends overlapped with regional variables and how constituencies were influenced by their geographical location. For the second group, they looked at variables like caste, class, region, religion, urban–rural differences, and language to examine cleavages. Field and Weiner’s pilot study examined three cleavages: ideological cleavages, regional, and ethnic cleavages which focused on cultural nationalism in Tamil Nadu and religion-based parties in Punjab, and caste-cum-factional rivalries in Uttar Pradesh and Mysore. With all these studies, they tried to stay uniform in their measures of participation, competitiveness, etc. They presented a preliminary version of these studies in June 1972.

1990s: Growth Trajectory of Election Polls The popularity of opinion polls started in the 1980s when Dr Prannoy Roy started conducting opinion polls during elections to



A Historical Overview of Election Studies in India

25

find out the mood of the Indian voters. The attempt by Dr Roy was to make opinion polls a scientific way of studying elections with number crunching and seat predictions. Thus in 1989, Dr Roy in collaboration with the Marketing and Research Group (MARG) conducted an exit poll when 77,000 voters were interviewed as soon as they came out of the polling booth after casting their votes. The poll predicted the victory of Congress and it was more or less accurate and election results later on confirmed the accuracy of the poll. “Vote Swing” calculated on the basis of gain or loss of vote share compared to the last election by political parties became a very popular word and Dr Roy became a household name among television viewers in India. The initiative taken by Dr Roy was picked up, and the media and opinion polling hit the growth trajectory in the 1990s aided by proliferation of electronic media in the corresponding period. Election surveys and exit polls for measuring voter’s opinion and behavior became quite popular in the country. Many factors contributed to the growing popularity of election surveys in India in the 1990s, but it expanded very fast due to mainly three factors: (a) it created a curiosity among the voters as well as political parties to know about the party which would win the elections and how many seats major political parties would win in the election before the actual election took place; (b) for political parties pre-poll surveys provided them information about the electoral behavior of the various sections of the voters and their political choices. The election data indicated the initial trends of parties winning prospects in different constituencies and the winnability assessment of candidates. This information became a key factor not only in selecting candidates for the different seats but also in planning their electoral campaign, and (c) for media it provided them immense data on the voting behavior and attitudes of the voters and helped them in analyzing the election and making seat forecast more comprehensively and in a detailed manner. The inquisitiveness of media in knowing the election results beforehand made electoral studies with election forecasting and seat prediction during elections quite prevalent and popular.

26

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

The beginning of the 21st century witnessed further growth of the opinion poll industry in India and the media started engaging various market research organizations to conduct polls during the elections. The polls were conducted for finding out the mood of the voters and predicting the outcomes of the elections. Apart from market research agencies like AC Nielsen and ORG MARG, new organizations like the Centre for Media Studies, Development and Research Services, C Voter also entered this industry of opinion polls and exit polls to analyze the voting behavior of the Indian electorates. Exit polls became the buzzword and election forecasting and predicting the number of seats that party combinations are likely to win in the national and state level elections became a regular feature during this decade. Among print media, India Today published the first poll in 1989 and since then it had been continuously conducting opinion polls of every major election and making election forecasts. The pre-polls done during this period focused on the electoral choices of voters, popularity rankings of leaders, opinion of voters on political issues, and last but not the least seat predictions. In the last two general elections of 2004 and 2009, almost all the prominent news channels in association with print media used market research agencies and other polling agencies for conducting election polls. Based on the survey data and using the expertise of pollsters and psephologists, seat predictions were made which were completely off the mark in 2004 and if not accurate showed the results in the right direction in 2009. Election surveys for finding out the opinion and attitudes of the voters also caught up with political parties in the 1990s when polling agencies were hired to conduct surveys and provide detailed reports about the existing political realities at the ground level. The Congress party conducted an all-India survey for knowing its poll prospects in 1996 secretly which was subsequently leaked in the media causing a lot of controversies and humdrum. However, it was the BJP that conducted an internal survey for the party and for the first time admitted it in public. The reason for conducting opinion polls by political parties was best summarized by the



A Historical Overview of Election Studies in India

27

late BJP leader Pramod Mahajan. He said that market surveys will increasingly be used in elections and believed that such surveys are an independent and scientific method of gathering vital information. These surveys are more independent than party networks that tend to confirm what the party already knows. A market survey tells us about the issues that are crucial in the elections, mapping of electoral constituencies that are strongholds of the political parties in contest, and constituencies where the parties have weak political presence. Based on these predictions, parties arrange public meetings and mount advertising campaigns and so on (Ghosh, 1996). However, the reason for political parties resorting to opinion polls during elections according to Yogendra Yadav is different and contrary to the views expressed by Pramod Mahajan. He says that when the political process fails, the market steps in. The routine processes of democratic politics have ceased to function properly and politicians know less and less about the people because there is no party mechanism. With the channels of information from the ground getting thinner, there is a need for an objective survey to know the truth (Ghosh, 1996). Thus a number of political parties started carrying out surveys to find out ground realities and in recent years even individual politicians have started getting surveys done in their own constituencies. The survey findings are sometimes shown as the proof of their popularity in the constituency for getting tickets. However, the use of opinion polls by political parties and candidates also brought about its misuse for manipulation. N. Bhaskara Rao of the Centre for Media Studies said that there is thus also a great opportunity for misuse in the business of opinion polling. Often these polls are just used as a tool by politicians to prove a desired conclusion. They have become money spinning rather than professional exercises. The methods that are used are in urgent need of reform. The polls sometimes do not even indicate the size of the sample, but simply try to project an all-India result on the basis of a small study. In fact, power brokers often commission these studies as a means to gain influence in a party, as there is so much money involved (Ghosh, 1996).

28

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

Election studies that were discontinued in the 1980s by the CSDS were revived in a big way in the mid-1990s. The formation of Lokniti, a program for comparative democracy at CSDS and the creation of an all-India network of political scientists in 1995, paved the way for undertaking the NES in 1996. The study undertook three waves: pre-election, mid-campaign, and post-poll using a panel design sample. Panel sample means going back to the same respondents for gathering their opinion. Additionally, Lokniti also undertook an exit poll with a much larger sample of 17,604. This study was widely reported both in academic circles and in the media. It was the basis for several research publications and is often cited by scholars analyzing Indian politics in general and its electoral politics in particular. At the time of the 1998 Lok Sabha elections, two waves—a pre-election and a postpoll survey—were carried out as part of NES 1998. This involved revisiting the panel of respondents sampled for the NES 1996. Yet another general election followed in 1999, and the centre reverted to the earlier practice of conducting only a post-poll survey, as this yielded a data set with the longest shelf value. During the NES 1999, the same panel of respondents, selected for the NES 1996 and 1998 were interviewed. Thus, a total of six waves of surveys of a nationally representative sample of the electorate were conducted in a short span of three years. A useful way of understanding the evolving tradition of CSDS surveys is to divide it into three generations of NES series conducted in India. The first generation of NES surveys were 1967, 1971, and 1980 which could be termed as the beginning of election studies at CSDS. The NES 1996–99 series were termed as the second-generation studies. The NES 2004 and 2009 form the part of the third generation of election surveys in the CSDS tradition. The second generation of NES (1996–1999) built upon the legacy of the first-generation election surveys while introducing some new features. The first and the most noticeable change was in the sample size, which was now expanded to more than double of that of the first-generation surveys. A self-weighted national probability sample was drawn; the enlarged sample size ensured



A Historical Overview of Election Studies in India

29

representative sample for major states along with national representation. As in the past, the PPS procedure was used for sampling parliamentary constituencies and the assembly segments. The second change was used for multi-wave surveys with panel design. The NES 1996 itself comprised three waves of polling: a preelection, mid-campaign, and a post-poll survey. Since the two Lok Sabha elections followed in quick succession, the same panel was extended for the NES 1998 and the NES 1999. The third major change pertained to the polling procedure. The second-generation NES started using dummy secret ballots and dummy ballot boxes for ascertaining the voting preference of the voters. This innovation brought much greater accuracy to estimating vote shares than was the case in the first generation. With the second generation, the NES moved beyond its dependence on purely academic grants and successfully secured funds from the media. Some of the leading media publications like the Hindu, India Today, Frontline, and the Economist supported the NES between 1996 and 1999. The media support brought greater visibility to the NES series while ensuring greater accountability and requiring a very short turnaround time. The NES 2004 marked the beginning of the third generation of CSDS surveys. This study was a post-poll survey in which the respondents are interviewed after voting ends and before the results are declared. Though the sample size was enlarged, the earlier practice of drawing a self-weighted national probability sample was replaced by a probability sample drawn at the state level. The sampling frame reflecting the changing reality of politics with a representative sample at the national level was achieved through an aggregation of the probability samples at the level of the states. Accordingly, the sample size was enlarged by nearly three times as compared to the NES of the second generation to allow a representative sample at the level of the smaller states. Better representativeness was sought by reducing the sample size at the primary sampling unit, the polling station area, so as to reduce the cluster effect. In analytical terms, abandoning a self-weighted sample meant the use of weightages for national level analysis of the data set.

30

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

The expansion in the coverage of NES had several corollaries. The number of languages that the questionnaire was translated into also increased. For the first time, some systematic attention was paid to the issue of “dialects” of the major languages. For the first time in the NES series, the questionnaire had stated specific questions designed keeping in mind the local political issues so as to help in state-level analysis of the survey data. The NES 2009 conducted by CSDS is the largest and the most comprehensive social scientific survey of an Indian general election and perhaps of any election in the world. In all 59,650 persons were approached and 37,365 interviews could be completed. Apart from its largest sample size election survey, some new innovations were introduced in 2009. These were: (a) for the first time in a national-level survey, five sets of questionnaires with “split sample” were randomly administered to the sampled voter; (b) the questionnaires carried additional survey modules on a range of different themes, covering topics such as the economy, security, communalism, democracy, and social values; and (c) substitution of respondents which was allowed during 2009 was not allowed in this round of survey under any circumstances. The NES series of the 1990s and the beginning of the 21st century brought many new innovations and research techniques making it the benchmark and state of the art studies on Indian elections. The political opinion, attitudes, and the voting behavior of the Indian electorates not only were measured within the existing sociological and political paradigms but could be analyzed with various dimensions and at several layers of disaggregation. Besides the NES series of election surveys, CSDS also started conducting election surveys of state assembly elections in the last decade. Between 1996 and 2009 at least one wave of election survey has been conducted for all the major state assembly elections except for few states to determine the voting behavior of the electorates at the state level. Apart from the extensive election studies to map the voting behavior and attitudes of the electorate, CSDS has also forayed into the survey method research from 2004 to 2009. The election predictions done during the last five years by CSDS was



A Historical Overview of Election Studies in India

31

a mixed baggage with 70 percent success rate in making accurate seat forecasts.

Case Studies and Electoral Ethnographic Studies The historical overview of election studies reveals that survey method has been and continues to be the most popular tool for measuring voting behavior and attitudes of the electorates in India. Apart from the survey method, there have been few constituency level studies and ethnographic studies conducted for studying electoral behavior and attitudes. Political scientists have mostly conducted constituency studies of electorates, whereas ethnographic studies based on participant observational method have been conducted mostly by social anthropologists and sociologists in India. Paul Brass was amongst the first to use the case study method in the 1977 and 1980 elections in Uttar Pradesh. He conducted detailed observation-based fieldwork research in five selected constituencies in the state. Subrat Mitra also conducted a case study of Lok Sabha and state assembly elections in 1979 in a village in Orissa. Both these case studies revealed that this method provided a more comprehensive observation of elections and minute details at the localized level. Leading sociologists M.N. Srinivas and A.M. Shah conducted participatory observation of electoral behavior in the late 1960s. Anthropologists also conducted electoral ethnographic studies to observe elections and study electoral behavior of the voters with a focus on symbolic aspects of elections and various rituals connected with it. Hauser and Singer conducted observational study of two elections in Bihar in the 1980s. Mukulika Banerjee also conducted an anthropological study in a village in West Bengal during state assembly elections held in 2007. These studies were focused more on the participatory observation of electoral behavior of the voters’ and qualitative aspects of elections. The findings of these localized ethnographic studies were limited in their scope, as it could not explain the processes and dynamics of the elections

32

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

at the broader canvas. These studies failed to take into account the opinion of the main stakeholders of elections and also in measuring the voting behavior of the electorates in quantitative terms. When anthropologists have chosen to study elections in particular, they have tended to neglect all quantitative data, often missing out even the most basic information about population sizes and socioeconomic status (Shah and Srinivas, 2007). During the general elections held in the year 2009, a new approach to study elections was attempted based on comprehensive electoral ethnographies in 12 sites across India. The “Comparative Electoral Ethnography Project” was conducted by Dr Mukulika Banerjee of University College London, in collaboration with the CSDS, Delhi. The study aimed at conducting a comparative study of Indian elections by bringing together the strengths of large-scale surveys and local level participatory investigations. According to Dr Banerjee, the advantage of Comparative Electoral Ethnography Study arises from the fact that it combines the disciplinary strengths and methodological approaches of both qualitative and quantitative approaches in the study of Indian elections. While the surveys/polls identify important patterns and apparent paradoxes, an ethnographer’s attentiveness, improvization, and wide-ranging interactions illuminate the electoral experience and its meanings to produce complementary, if often, challenging insights. The study of the Indian elections deserves the best of both these approaches so as to create a synergy of different approaches and expertise. According to Dr Banerjee, rather than treating elections as dry statistical events that focus on the “numbers game” and results, elections in this project will be studied with their full cultural and cosmological meaning, as the most important modern and secular festival of democratic India. This study will therefore generate new, comparative understandings and collective insights into the social, political, and cultural life of elections in India as a whole despite the enormous local variations and will lead to new understandings of democracy within contemporary India. The study



A Historical Overview of Election Studies in India

33

aimed to capture the diversity of the electoral experience across different settings in India through simultaneous studies by a team of participant observers in multiple sites covering all aspects of the electoral procedure and popular participation. It aimed to cover all aspects of electoral competition from nominations, campaigning, and media coverage to voting and the declaration of results. The study addressed the following research questions: (a) Why do people vote? (b) What is the Culture of the Polling station? (c) What is the language of voting and the vocabulary of politics and participation? (d) What is a typical election campaign in India? and (e) What is the role of the media in elections? The study used multiple research tools that included: (a) indepth interviews with the voters and the main candidates; (b) audio visual record of speeches made by candidates at meetings; (c) spot interviews about the content and style of the speech addressed to members of the audience; (d) detailed content analysis of political messages and political styles of politicians; (e) television coverage by shadowing “a stringer” reporter to observe closely how stories were captured, made, and filed; and ( f ) interviews with a sample of voters to record their consumption of radio, television, and newspaper.

3 The Multiple Methods of Measuring Voting Choices

How accurately one can measure voting behavior to a great extent depends upon what tools were used for measuring voting behavior. There are various methods which are used for measuring voting behavior, each having its own advantages and disadvantages. The survey method is considered as one of the best methods for measuring voting behavior when it is aimed at measuring voting behavior of voters spread across a vast locality, the state, or for much bigger geographical area. If the effort is to measure voting behavior only for one constituency, one village, town, or just few constituencies, the constituency studies may also be a good method for measuring voting behavior in one constituency. It may be useful for the researcher to spend a longer time in that particular location to try and understand the dynamics of voting behavior in that locality. But if the effort is for measuring voting behavior of a cross-section of voters, not in one, two, or few constituencies, but for larger number of constituencies, it may be impossible for the researcher to spend a longer time in all those constituencies. Under such circumstances, the researcher is dependent upon someone else to collect information on his behalf, which he can use for analyzing voting behavior. Now the issue before him is if all those collecting information on his/her behalf collect information in the way they want or all of them should follow some uniform method. It is desirable that all those collecting information regarding voting



The Multiple Methods of Measuring Voting Choices

35

behavior should be doing that in a uniform format, which is easy to comprehend, compare, and analyze once the information is collected. There is a need for maintaining standardization in data collection and analysis. This standardization can be achieved once the survey method is used for measuring voting behavior. Thus for measuring voting behavior and attitudes, the cross-section of voters’ survey continue to be the most effective research method. Among the various survey methods used for measuring voting behavior, exit polls conducted on the day of voting continue to be the most popular method in India. Exit polls are also popular in other democratic countries and are extensively used for analyzing elections and measuring voting behavior. However, the pre-election surveys done before the elections for measuring electoral behavior and voting intentions have also caught up with the Indian academia and the media. The elections held in the last half decade in India show that pre-election surveys and exit polls were more widely used to unravel the patterns of voting behavior of the electorates. It was also used in making election forecasts based on the voting preferences of the electorates. But pre-election survey and exit polls-based election predictions went off the mark in the last two crucial general elections raising doubts about the reliability of the survey method in measuring voting behavior in India. On the other hand, exit polls in other countries particularly the USA have accurately studied the voting intention and behavior of the electorate and have made correct election forecasts. Thus it becomes relevant to comparatively analyze the polling methods used in India with the exit polls in the USA to find out the reasons for the failure of polls in accurately measuring voting behavior in India. This also raises competing questions associated with it— whether exit polls are the best survey method of measuring voting behavior or pre-elections and post-poll surveys are better suited for measuring electoral behavior? Whether the method used for conducting exit polls in India for studying electoral behavior are methodologically the same as that used in other parts of the globe or are there dissimilarities and country-specific peculiarities? Amongst various methods used for measuring voting behavior like

36

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

pre-election survey, post-poll survey, or exit polls, which method is methodologically more robust? This chapter will try to address these questions and provide detailed analysis of the various kinds of methods used for measuring voting behavior in India. This chapter is divided into three sections: The first section discusses in detail the different interviewing technique used for conducting interviews with the voters for collecting information for measuring voting behavior. It focuses on different interviewing techniques like interviews through emails, telephonic interviews, face-to-face interviews, drop-off survey, and online surveys. This chapter highlights the main features and characteristics as well as weakness of these interviewing techniques. The second section provides an in-depth account of the different types of election polls used in the first world for measuring voting behavior. Apart from exit polls which are also popular in many countries of the world, snap polls, tracking polls, and rolling polls are the most predominant type of polls in the USA and Europe. The unique feature of these polls along with their advantages and disadvantages will also be discussed in this section and in the final section the focus will be on the popular types of election surveys used for measuring voting behavior in India, with a view to finding out similarities and dissimilarities with election surveys in other countries of the world. It also attempts to find out whether the polls used for measuring voting behavior in India is a complete replication of the method used for measuring voting behavior in the West or is there any adaptation of those methods to the Indian situation. This section also comparatively analyzes the strength and weakness of the surveys used in India which will help in assessing the existing status of polling industry in India in terms of growth and development.

Modes of Interviewing Techniques for Measuring Voting Behavior The popular modes of conducting interviews during an election survey for measuring voting behavior are interviews using email,



The Multiple Methods of Measuring Voting Choices

37

conducting interviews over telephone, face-to-face interviews, drop-off survey techniques of interview, and online surveys. In first world countries, election surveys are more often conducted telephonically, compared to face-to-face being the dominant mode of interview during election surveys in developing countries. The reason for conducting telephonic interviews in developed countries arises from the fact that face-to-face interviews are manpower intensive and very expensive. The mode of telephonic interviews has seen a lot of innovations and technological advancements and conducting interview using the telephone has become relatively much more reliable and accurate. But for measuring voting behavior of a cross-section of voters, in India, face-to-face interviews are the most popular method of interviewing even today mainly because it may be difficult to select a random sample of voters using the telephone directly since all voters do not have access to a telephone. The face-to-face method still remains the most popular method of interviewing, though other modes of interviewing like telephone and online surveys have also started picking up with media and market research agencies while conducting election surveys.

Face-to-Face Interview In this kind of interview method, the voters are selected using a bigger pool of voters—may be from the voters list, from the telephone directly, or even using simple random method—and then the selected voters are contacted for interview either at their home or at their work place. For election surveys in India, the voters list provided by the election commission of India provides addresses and other details of all registered voters. The questions are asked from the voters using a structured interview schedule and the voters are expected to answer those questions. During the interviews in the face-to-face situation, the questionnaire is not handed over to the voters in any situation. Trained field investigators conduct the interview of the respondent in person and record the answer on a survey schedule or questionnaire.

38

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

There are various advantages in using the face-to-face method of conducting interviews. Over the years, there has been some decline in the interest of the voters in election surveys especially in urban locations. Due to some decline in the interest of the voters in election survey, the chances of non-response would be much higher if the other methods of interviewing like mail survey, email survey, or interviews over telephone are used for conducting interview. The face-to-face interview situation helps in minimizing the problem of non-response. The chances of voters willing to give an interview are much higher if there is a face-face-face interaction with the investigators compared to if the investigator is not present during the time of interview. In the face-to-face interview situation, the field investigator has greater control over the respondent. The investigator can convince the respondent for agreeing to give interviews by explaining the purpose of the survey, how they have been selected, why their opinion is important and by assuring the sampled voters confidentiality about their responses. In the faceto-face interview situation, the field investigator can use various aids like visuals or photographs while conducting interviews. This helps in breaking the monotony of the sampled voters while conducting interviews. While there are various advantages of face-to-face interviews, there are various limitations as well. Face-to-face interviews are both capital and manpower intensive compared to other forms of interviews, like the mail, post, or telephonic. Unlike other modes of interviews, the interview conducted in the face-to-face situation is very time consuming and a lengthy process. It requires trained field investigators and supervisors who are trained in survey research and interviewing techniques. The face-to-face interviews suffer from biases and subjectivity of the interviewers, which can result in higher measurement error. Also in the face-to-face interview situation, the investigators can be easily influenced by leading questions from the interviewer. Enumerators’ facial expressions, gesture, and body language can lead the respondents to answer what they think the interviewer wants to hear. Thus many voters feel forced to answer what they think is politically right and socially acceptable.



The Multiple Methods of Measuring Voting Choices

39

Interview Using Mail/Post Using mail or post as the method of interview, the voters are first selected with details of his/her address using a list of addresses or voter list of the target group. Once the voters are sampled for conducting interviews, normally an advance notice letter is mailed to the sampled respondents informing her/him that she/he has been selected for the survey. The advance notice is followed by mailing/posting the actual survey questionnaire to all the selected respondents. It is expected that the sampled voters will mail back the filled-in questionnaire to the researcher or the institution using the pre-stamped envelope, which is normally enclosed with the questionnaire. If the sampled voter does not send back the filled in questionnaire within a stipulated time, then a reminder postcard is sent with a request to send back the same. If the sampled voters do not send back the filled-in questionnaire after receiving the first reminder, they are usually sent the second reminder. Though the online interviews are becoming increasingly popular, this mode of interview still continues to be widely used due to a wider reach and coverage of mails in most of the countries. The strengths of conducting interview using mail method during survey for measuring voting behavior are: First it requires lesser financial resources and also relatively few human resources. So this method of interview is both cost and manpower effective. The reason is that it is the voters themselves who fill the questionnaires and the situation does not demand the presence of field enumerators to record the responses. The advantage of using the mail method of interview is that the interviews can be conducted without engaging trained field investigators who have professional expertise in conducting interviews. Another advantage of mail interviews is that it leaves greater scope for the voter to maintain secrecy about their answers since he/she can fill the responses without the presence of anyone else. This becomes very useful for answering the sensitive or socially undesirable questions or questions which are confidential in nature. Finally, since there are no investigators involved, it helps in doing away with interviewer’s

40

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

biases and subjectivity that normally creeps in during the face-toface interview situations in spite of rigorous training. However, the mail interviews also have certain inherent weaknesses compared with other interviewing techniques. The mail interviews can result in a non-coverage error since at times the voters list of the address list from where the sample of voters has been drawn is not updated. Thus voters who are not listed on the address list or on the voter list from which the sample is drawn are automatically excluded from the survey resulting in coverage error. Getting a complete updated list of addresses at any point of time is a little difficult. The mail surveys also suffer from a higher non-response since voters generally tend to respond less to mailed questionnaires compared to if the voters are approached in person for the interview. The reminders sent to selected voters for filling the questionnaires and sending them back also do not completely address this problem. Third there is an element of inherent bias in sample selection since the mail interviews can only be conducted amongst voters who are educated, who can read and write. The mail method of interview cannot be used for conducting interviews intended to measure voting behavior of a cross-section of voters. Also this method of interview suffers from the weakness of having no control on who actually filled/answered the questions. There are possibilities of someone else marking the answers rather than the sampled voters. In the mail interviews, one can never be sure that the responses marked on the questionnaire are actually the opinions of the voters who were sampled or whether the responses were of someone else in that house. Since most voting behavior studies demand interviews to be conducted in a short period of time, the mail method of interviews is not at all useful for conducting interviews for election surveys.

Telephone Survey In this method of interview, the interviews with the selected voters are conducted over the telephone. The voters are sampled from a



The Multiple Methods of Measuring Voting Choices

41

telephone directory or yellow pages or from a similar such list. The sample is selected from using a random number of software techniques that have been developed for telephone-assisted surveys and are as robust as manual random method of sample selection using voters’ list. Those who are selected in the sample are interviewed at the time of the first phone call or at another time as per their convenience. Interviewers record the answers of the voters either on a survey format or record it directly into the computers. Telephonic survey is very popular in the first world for measuring voting behavior and attitudes, but in India it is still not feasible, as a large majority of the electorates do not have telephone connectivity. The strengths of this mode of interviewing are: (a) if the theme of the election study is topical and interesting for the respondents, non-response error tends to be very low; (b) the greatest advantage of telephone survey is its ability to produce quick results. Interviewers can complete more telephonic interviews in a given time period compared to the number of interviews conducted using the face-to-face interview technique. Since the interviews are conducted centrally on telephones, interviews can be better controlled as supervisors can deal with any problems that may arise on the spot immediately. It also facilitates better control over the respondent/voters as the interviewer can encourage/coax them to answer all the questions. It is also helpful in avoiding the influence and interference of others as it happens at a respondent’s residence or place of work; and (c) compared with face-to-face interviews it is a much cheaper method of conducting empirical surveys. Telephone interviews also have some inherent weaknesses such as: (a) everybody in the universe of study (electorates) may not have a telephone. Hence a subgroup of people is mechanically excluded from the survey resulting in serious coverage error; (b) weakness of this survey is that some people are less likely to respond to telephone interviews than others. Thus non-response error can be a serious problem; (c) problem is that the telephone directory in most cases from where the sampling is done is outdated or incomplete and may not be regularly updated; (d ) the

42

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

weakness of this kind of interview is to have a knowledgeable experienced supervisor to conduct it. Thus telephone interviews require trained and really experienced researchers to achieve accurate results; (e) in this method of interviewing, there are higher chances of measurement errors, as a result of various vocal errors, a respondent can make mistakes in reading and listening to the response, the voter can make mistakes in listening to what was asked by the investigator. During the telephone interviews, many sampled voters may not reveal their actual opinion on certain electoral issues and provide answers that they think are politically correct and socially acceptable. Apart from these three modes of conducting interviews during election surveys for measuring electoral behavior, there are other kinds of surveys like drop-off and online survey. Drop-off election surveys combine features of both face-to-face interviews and mail surveys from a vantage viewpoint. This survey combines the low cost of mail surveys with the personal contact of face-to-face interviews. In this mode of survey, the field investigator delivers the questionnaire to the sampled voters by hand at their residence or place of work. Respondents complete the questionnaire on their own and then either return them by mail or keep them for the field investigators to collect. Online election surveys are conducted by sending questionnaires to sampled respondents through the Internet and answers recorded. However, this mode of survey cannot be used for measuring the opinion and attitudes of a cross-section of voters in India as the Internet penetration is still very less.

Popular Election Polls in the First World There are different types of opinion polls that are used in different countries of the world to study elections and measure voting behavior. The types of opinion polls that are commonly used are pre-poll, exit poll, tracker poll, snap poll, and the rolling poll. However, tracker poll, snap poll, and the rolling poll are surveys that are popular in the first world and are not used so frequently



The Multiple Methods of Measuring Voting Choices

43

in developing countries. A quick sketch of these polls, the purpose for which they are done, and their procedural nuances would be helpful in understanding their uniqueness and differentiation with election surveys used in other parts of the world and more particularly India. It will also provide a holistic and comparative perspective for analyzing the election polls that are popularly used in India later on in this chapter. Snap polls: As the term suggests snap polls are generally done within a short notice to check the mood of the people on important issues which can be political, economic, etc., and impact the electoral fortune of the incumbent government. The purpose of the poll is to quickly approach the people or voters and find out their opinions on issues that may be fast changing at a particular point of time and reveal the findings. Snap polls quickly collect the information for instant use and are generally not aimed at tracking the opinion and attitude of the voters in the long run. Thus technically it is not an election survey for measuring voting behavior in the strict sense of the term. It is widely used by pollsters to get a snapshot of voter’s opinion on any issues that are crucial for people’s interest. This poll adheres to all the parameters of other types of election surveys like random sampling, adequate sample size, and formal questionnaire. A good example of snap polls done in India recently was during the parliamentary discussion on the Indo-US nuclear deal in 2007 when the left parties who were supporting the UPA government decided to withdraw support from the incumbent UPA government. A snap poll was conducted by CSDS-CNN-IBN to find out the opinion of people on the nuclear deal issue and connected issues like whether the threat of withdrawal of support by the Left was right or wrong, etc. The length of the interview schedule for this snap poll is generally short with few questions, so that the interviews can be completed quickly. One of the advantages of this poll is that if there is a requirement, it can be repeated in the future to track the changing mood of the voters on the issues if it is still relevant and converted into a tracking poll. As compared with other types of poll, this does not have a durable shelf life, as the

44

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

issues on which such polls are conducted are normally the current issue, which may lose importance in the long run. Snap polls are more popular with media as compared with others. Tracking polls: This is a method of polling, which is done usually to measure the changing opinion of the people on certain issues. This kind of poll is very popular in the USA, which is used for tracking the changing popularity rating of political leaders and parties based on voter’s opinion and choices. The interviews are conducted after short intervals though there is no prescribed time of what this interval should be. One could repeat it every week, fortnightly, every month, after every six months, or even after a much longer time period. The time interval may vary, but the questions, which we want to ask, should be changed. Such polls are generally used for measuring popular support for the candidates in election, popularity rating of various leaders, changing support base of political parties, measuring voting intentions of voters, etc. The tracking poll is helpful in measuring the changing patterns in opinions and attitudes over a period of time. It tracks the upward or downward trends of support depending upon a lot of factors on which the voters form their decision to support and which changes after a period of time. Thus US presidential preelection tracking polls start at the stage of primaries and culminate with the final polling for the elections of the American president. Tracking polls show the vote share trends based on a long-term tracking in which the opinion is gathered from the same set of sampled respondents and finally forecast the winner of the election. These polls are done by different opinion polling organizations. Tracking polls are based on scientific surveys and follow all the prescribed protocols for conducting any standard election survey. Some questions remain the same in all the polls but new ones are added at every round that is topical and current and helps explain the fluctuation in the trends for the candidates. The most important aspect of this poll is that it reports gains and losses for candidates and parties over a long period of time depending upon election debates and stand taken by parties on important national issues and ways for addressing them if voted to power.



The Multiple Methods of Measuring Voting Choices

45

Rolling polls: This type of poll is also commonly used for measuring voting behavior and attitudes by the media in many democratic countries of the world. As the term suggests, there are many rounds of polls, which are held in a staggered manner, which is finally rolled into one big poll. Rolling polls are many polls done over a period of time and in each round the data are collected from a representative sample of voters. In each round, the interviews are conducted amongst a small sample of representative voters, drawn afresh and the findings are reported separately on findings from each round and also after merging the new sample with the previous samples making the sample size bigger and bigger. Thus after each round of polls, the data are added and on its completion it finally becomes one single poll. Like tracking polls this survey consists of some questions like the popularity of parties, candidates, voters’ choice which are common and are asked in all rounds of poll but it leaves the space open for including questions in every round that are current issues and topical. The advantage in this poll is that it enables the researcher to add new questions to every round of polling which may come up as a campaign progresses. If we plan to do one big survey at one go, questions would be frozen at the very beginning and one would have no scope to add new questions while the survey is on. The biggest advantage of this poll is that it can periodically track the election trends and data collected after each poll can be used and after the end of the final roll it can be added to become one big poll which is used for measuring voting behavior and predicting the election outcomes accurately. However, there is a major difference between the tracking poll and rolling poll. Tracking polls are conducted among the same respondents over a period of time and each poll is a separate poll. On the other hand, each round of rolling polls is held among different samples and is also a separate poll but it can be merged at the end to become one single poll. Thus it has the advantages of both tracking polls and a single large survey held at one point of time for computing electoral behavior and attitudes.

46

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

Types of Election Surveys in India For measuring the voting behavior and attitudes of the Indian electorate, pre-poll and exit polls are popularly used by the media and market research organization during elections. In India, though exit polls are the most popular method of election survey, it is considered to be the most inaccurate for computing voting behavior. An innovative type of poll called post-poll election survey was developed in India by CSDS to find out the voting behavior and attitudes of the electorate confirming the highest levels of statistical accuracy. The post-poll survey developed by CSDS has caught the imagination of the academia and researchers both in India and abroad and is frequently used for studying the voting behavior of the Indian electorate. The types of election polls with which people are very familiar in India are pre-poll and exit poll surveys. A pre-poll survey as the name indicates is an election survey that is conducted before the elections are held for measuring popular choices about political parties, contesting candidates, and political leaders. It also helps in measuring voting behavior amongst different sections of voters. The pre-poll surveys are conducted before elections, but there is no fixed time as when the pre-poll election surveys are conducted. These may be conducted a few months before the election, a month before election, or may be a few weeks before elections. Increasingly it has been observed that the political leaders and political parties get the pre-poll surveys conducted a few months before the election, in order to assess the popularity of the leaders and to assess the possible issues during the forthcoming elections. For parties, the pre-poll survey gives them a correct picture of the party’s prospects in election, finding out issues that will have an impact in the elections, identify seats where they are strong or weak and most importantly their support base among different caste communities. While the pre-poll survey conducted a few months before elections helps in flagging the issues, strength, and weakness of candidates and political parties, such pre-polls are hardly helpful in making a correct assessment of support base of



The Multiple Methods of Measuring Voting Choices

47

political party. This is mainly because a large proportion of voters do not make up their mind about which party to vote for at such an advanced stage. Political parties, which rely on such opinion polls too much, are bound to feel that these opinion polls were incorrect. Pre-polls done by media houses for measuring voting behavior are based on large samples of voters, with interviews conducted in the face-to-face interviewing situation, using structured interview schedule. Though the sampling details are not always revealed, election experts and pollsters believe that neither do they use the scientific method of sample selection for selecting the locations within the constituency nor do they use the scientific method for selecting the voters for the survey. They usually resort to an easier method of sampling called quota sampling. The surveys done by media are primarily for the purpose of finding out the popularity of the political parties and candidates based on the voter opinion. For media, pre-poll survey findings are information, which provides talking points for political discussions and debates. The findings of some such polls also help in laying down the agenda for the campaign for some political parties and candidates. On the other hand, academic institutions, like CSDS, conduct pre-poll survey to find out the overall electoral trends, patterns, and the mood of the Indian voters. The survey focuses on finding out the voting intentions of electorates, measuring voters’ opinion on issues related to governance, the level of satisfaction with the work done by the state government, popularity rating of various leaders, and similar such issues. It also compares the performance of the incumbent government with its predecessors, voters’ awareness, levels of electoral issues, and their possible impact on voting decisions of the voters. An important feature of CSDS pre-election survey that makes it distinct from other surveys is the use of a scientific method of sampling technique called “Multi stage systematic random sampling.” This sampling technique is quite robust and the data on opinion attitudes collected by CSDS are fairly representative and more accurate compared to such data collected by other organizations/agencies.

48

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

The advantages of conducting pre-poll survey for measuring voting behavior are: first, it provides a glimpse of the prevailing political scenario before elections, the issues which concern the common voters, how people evaluate the work of the government, how people rate different political leaders and various such electionrelated issues. In a way it helps in setting the tone of the election campaign if the findings of such pre-poll surveys are taken seriously. It helps in making an objective assessment of the popularity of political leaders, strength, and weakness of political parties and also to make an assessment of voting intentions. Sometimes the estimates of vote share are also used for making estimates about which party is likely to win how many seats. Though pre-election survey is useful in studying the voting behavior and attitudes of voters before the elections are held, it has two major disadvantages stacked against it: it fails to filter out voters who are unlikely to vote, making this method ill suited and error prone for making estimates for vote share for different political parties, resulting in an inaccurate seat forecast. Second, in the era of phased elections and with new guidelines when pre-poll surveys are not allowed to be made public two days before elections, the interviews with the voters in many constituencies are conducted much before even the candidates are announced. Under such circumstances, large numbers of voters hardly make up their mind when interviews are being conducted with them and are being asked to express their voting preferences. Under such circumstances, the chances of vote estimates being inaccurate are higher compared to interviews, which are conducted much closer to the day of the election. Needless to say that chances of error in estimates of voting behavior would be higher in surveys compared to a survey, which estimates the voting behavior more accurately. Also such pre-poll surveys fail to measure last minute changes in voting intentions, if any, resulting in inaccurate measurement of voting behavior. Exit polls, as its name overtly suggests, is an election survey, which is conducted among voters as they come out or exit from the polling station after casting their vote on the polling day. This survey is also known as Election Day polling as the survey is



The Multiple Methods of Measuring Voting Choices

49

conducted and completed on the day of polling. Exit poll as a tool for measuring political choices, political opinions, and attitudes of the voters are quite popular in many democratic countries of the world and are widely used as a tool for measuring voting behavior of the electorates. The situation is no different in India as a quick scan of election polling industry reveals that exit poll is the most common tool used for measuring electoral behavior in India. Exit poll as a tool for studying elections in India is generally considered to be a direct import from the USA and replicated without any change in procedural techniques and features. In such a situation, it becomes relevant to do a comparative study of exit poll as a tool for studying voting behavior in India with exit polls in the USA to find out whether they are similar or dissimilar in forms and features. In this context, it would be pertinent to trace the evolution of exit poll in the USA, the purpose for which it was used, and the use of methodological techniques before comparing it with exit polls in India. Exit polls were first conducted in the USA in 1964 as an experimental exercise in which the poll findings were extrapolated with actual voting results of some districts for election forecasting. In the 1970s, exit polls were conducted more extensively to explain voting behavior of the Americans and the election results rather than forecasting elections. It was only in 1980 that an early exit poll was carried out and the data were used to predict that Ronald Reagan was going to win the US presidential elections by defeating Jimmy Carter. The exit poll based election predictions turned out to be correct while most of the pre-election surveys conducted during this election failed to capture the mood of the American electorate and went wrong. Thus exit polls became the principle tool for measuring voting behavior and political choices in the USA not only for the purpose of predicting the results but also in measuring the characteristics, attitudes, behavior, and voting intentions of American voters. The method of conducting exit polls in the USA is very scientific as the sample is selected using many layers that they call precincts on a systematic random basis. The method of conducting

50

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

these polls is very innovative as skip intervals for conducting the interviews outside the polling stations are fixed based on expected turnouts in the provinces with strict compliance procedures for selecting the voters. The questionnaire used for exit polls have around 20 to 50 close-ended questions on political ideology and partisanship, voting intentions, choice of candidates and reasons for it, and demographic variables like gender, age, education, occupation, and income. Unlike in India, the questionnaires are filled by the voters themselves and dropped in a ballot box carried by the enumerator to maintain the sanctity and secrecy of the vote. Exit polls are considered the most effective method of studying elections in the USA as it provides the most accurate answers to the voting intentions of American voters and making a quick estimation of the election results. Besides this it also forms the best data archive for studying voting behavior and attitudes for academia. On the other hand, the development of exit poll as a tool for studying elections in India evolved on a different plane and appears to be quite dissimilar with exit polls conducted in the USA and other democratic countries of the world. Exit polls in India developed as a tool used by market research organizations and polling agencies to ascertain the vote share of the major political parties for the purpose of making seat forecast ahead of the actual counting of votes. Exit polls rarely made any serious attempt to measure the voting behavior and analyze the political opinions and attitudes of the voters. The method used for conducting exit polls in India involved conducting face-to-face interviews with randomly selected voters, coming out of the polling booth after casting their votes. The randomly selected voters are interviewed about their political choices and other related questions using a small questionnaire with a handful of questions. The sampling technique initially used was based on contacting the voters randomly based on a pre-fixed random number and a certain number of interviews were conducted within a fixed time slot. The sampling technique later on underwent changes and most of the organizations that conduct exit polls now fix certain quotas based on gender, age groups, class, etc., for conducting interviews at the selected polling



The Multiple Methods of Measuring Voting Choices

51

stations. The sampling method that is mostly used in exit polls in India never developed in a scientific manner as in the USA. While in the USA the interval at which the voter should be selected is fixed on a comparably robust estimate of possible turnout in that particular polling booth, but in India, it is randomly fixed without any rationale. Also at times the investigators do not even bother to follow the prescribed interval and simply try to interview as many voters as possible, so that he has a sizeable number of interviews at the end. Also the purpose of most of the exit polls in India have been to find out the vote estimates for different parties and making a forecast about which party will win how many seats. There had hardly been any attempt for making serious analysis of voting behavior based on exit polls. The exit poll has failed to fully develop as a tool for making serious voting behavior analysis. Thus the exit polls conducted in India are different from exit polls in the USA and other countries not only in the purpose for which it is done but also in sampling techniques and methods of conducting the survey. The findings of exit polls have only an instant value so they attract only the media. They do not interest the academia and researchers, as the use of short questionnaires do not allow more questions to be asked. This method does not allow collecting sufficient information to explain the electoral behavior of the voters and political choices. The advantages of conducting exit polls in India are: (a) it is one of the quickest methods for conducting election survey and analyzing data and (b) it requires the least amount of finances and is the most cost-effective method of conducting election surveys. However, there are a lot of limitations also in the way exit polls are conducted in India such as: First since people are interviewed just outside the polling booth, many voters, especially the poor, feel intimidated by the presence of a lot of people, like party workers, security forces, and government officials outside the polling booth and where he/she is being interviewed. As a result, voters from this section fear in responding to the voting question or provide misleading answers; second, the investigator does not strictly follow the quota method of sampling since he is in a hurry to complete as many interviews as possible.

52

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

The voters interviewed in the exit poll in most cases are unrepresentative of the actual demographics resulting in inaccurate vote estimates. The post-poll survey is an indigenous method of survey for measuring voting behavior developed in India. Post-poll survey is a unique method of conducting election survey which was pioneered by CSDS in the 1960s wherein the voters were interviewed after the polling was complete in the relaxed confines of their homes. In the first generation of post-poll studies in the 1960s, the survey was conducted months after the whole election process was complete. This led to a problem: Since the survey was held months after elections were over, a large number of voters forgot whom they had voted for leading to as high as 20 percent over or underreporting in vote estimates. Normally, the over reporting in vote estimates was in favor of the winning party and the underreporting was for the losing party. This problem was sorted out in the second generation of CSDS post-poll surveys that were conducted immediately after the polling was over and was completed before the election results were declared. As a result of this, the vote share estimates of the political parties in post-poll surveys were much closer to the actual vote share of the parties vindicating high levels of accuracy in computing voting behavior and attitudes of the electorates. What helped in minimizing the error in vote estimates was the use of secret methods for asking the voting questions. Earlier this question was asked as any other question, which was changed to using a dummy ballot paper and dummy ballot box for asking the voting question. This enabled the voter to maintain his/her secrecy of vote and encouraged him/her to give a much more honest answer. The post-poll survey for measuring voting behavior is purely an academic exercise done with the purpose of doing the postmortem analysis of the elections. The survey is done to probe the voting behavior and attitudes of the voters, for whom they voted and the considerations of the voting, issues that had an impact on their voting decisions and questions related with electoral outcomes. The sampling method used and the method of data collection is



The Multiple Methods of Measuring Voting Choices

53

the same as that used for pre-poll elections conducted by CSDS. The questionnaire designing, fieldwork and data collection, and quality controls of this survey match the best practices and protocols used in international election surveys. The advantages of conducting a post-poll survey are: First it provides a good estimate of the electoral participation of the voters and their voting intentions as they are immediately conducted after the polls are over; second unlike exit polls, which are conducted just outside the polling booth, it is carried out at the residence of the voters where they feel relaxed and free to answer the questions on the voting behavior and electoral choices; third the electoral data collected through this method have a lot of intrinsic value and serve as a good archive for future use by academia and researchers; and finally post-poll election surveys provide most accurate vote estimates as compared with the other methods of survey which are used for forecasting elections. This method of survey is the best way for studying elections and computing electoral behavior but also has some drawbacks: First it is a costly method of conducting election surveys and getting financial support for this kind of study is difficult as media is more keen in supporting pre-election surveys and exit polls and second it is a very rigorous and time consuming method of conducting surveys which do not attract researchers in the present times who want to complete the fieldwork quickly and instantly. Apart from these three types of election surveys that are popular in India, some novel election surveys like mid-campaign surveys were also conducted in the 1990s by CSDS. Mid-campaign surveys were done at the fag end of election campaigns with the purpose of finding out the effect of election campaign on voters’ political choices. This was a full-scale survey that was conducted with the aim of estimating the change in voting behavior of the electorate as a result of the campaign by political parties and candidates. However, this election survey did not become very popular in India as it measured voting behavior in a limited sense and remained restricted to researchers and academicians.

4 Importance of Scientific Sampling in Election Survey

This chapter begins by dispelling some myths and misperceptions associated with the sample coverage of opinion polls. Are opinion polls or exit polls conducted in all the constituencies of the state for which one is attempting to measure the voting behavior? Does one conduct the opinion poll or the exit poll in all the Lok Sabha constituencies, if there is an attempt to measure voting behavior for a national election? Are all voters interviewed during the prepoll survey or the exit poll? The simple answer is, no generally, when an attempt is made to measure voting behavior, the pre-poll or exit poll is not conducted in all the constituencies, neither are all the voters interviewed. The information is collected normally in a few constituencies and amongst few registered voters. The follow-up questions are why don’t we conduct the pre-poll or exit poll in all the constituencies and interview all the registered voters? Is it incorrect to do that? No, it is not incorrect to conduct the pre-poll or exit poll in all the constituencies and interview all the voters, but it is simply not possible to even attempt to collect the information from all the registered voters. The time and resources needed for doing that would be enormous and the work of the collection of information may not simply be completed. The questions and curiosity do not stop at that stage, the immediate related question which arises is, who should be interviewed, how many voters should be interviewed for collection of



Importance of Scientific Sampling in Election Survey

55

information about voting preferences and related issues? Will the information collected on voting behavior from voters truly reflect the voting behavior of all the voters? We will try and answer some of these questions in this chapter. How accurately voting behavior can be measured depends largely on how representative the sample of voters is from whom the data have been collected about their voting preferences and other issues. More than a bigger sample, it is the quality of the sample, which largely determines how accurately one can measure voting behavior. The quality of sample refers to how representative the sample of voters is, to what extent the sample of voters from whom the information has been collected mirrors the image of the voters about whom the study is being done. The selection of the sample of voters, from the entire voters in the state or in the country depending upon the study, is a challenging task. The challenge is in terms of how to select a few voters from a larger number of voters that should be representative of all the voters. In simple terms, we can say the sample of voters should be selected randomly, without using one’s bias and preference. If the sample of voters is selected randomly without using any bias, the probability of getting a representative sample is high. The collection of information from a representative sample to a great extent ensures that the measure of voting behavior would be reliable/accurate to a great extent. While in our day-to-day common usage, we can say that for reliable measurement of voting behavior, one needs to select the voters for conducting interviews randomly, without any preference or bias, but in practice, the selection of these voters is done in a slightly more scientific way to ensure that even a smaller sample should reflect the mirror of all the voters who are extremely diverse, both geographically and in terms of social characteristics. The method used for the selection of a smaller number of voters from a much bigger pool of voters is referred to as the technique of sampling. There are various methods and techniques of sampling for selecting the voters for pre-poll and exit polls, but the technique generally used by most of those who are engaged in the work of

56

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

measuring voting behavior is simple random sampling, which is to say that the voters are selected randomly, without any bias, though most of them do not apply the systematic sampling method for selection of voters. This is done mostly at the level of the selection of voters, but prior to that for selection of constituencies and location where the data will be collected. The locations are selected either by this random method or by the purposive sampling technique. The failure of election surveys to measure voting behavior accurately and forecasting election results correctly has raised questions on the credibility and reliability of election surveys in India. The reasons for its failures are manifold, but one of the attributes of election surveys that have been subjected to severe criticisms is the failure to employ scientific methods of sampling at various levels. While most of those who conduct research on voting behavior do make an attempt to make scientific selection of constituencies, when it comes to selection of locations and finally the voters, who need to be interviewed, generally adopt shortcut method and deviate from the systematic method of sample selection. It is alleged that the sampling techniques used in pre-poll surveys and exit poll are not scientific and the selection of voters in most of the surveys is done in an arbitrary and unscientific manner. These criticisms are justified to a great extent, but cannot be true for the studies on voting behavior in India. It is true that the sampling techniques followed by a few market research organizations for election polls are not done scientifically and resort to convenience and cost cutting practices. A few such election surveys have revealed that they were conducted only in urban areas and among the educated voters making the sample lopsided and unrepresentative of the electorates. As a result such election surveys have failed in their attempt to measure the voting behavior accurately and predicting the electoral forecasts correctly. Apart from the questionable sampling techniques used in election surveys, the sample adequacy and the minimum number of voters required for an election survey have also been a contentious and widely debated issue in India.



Importance of Scientific Sampling in Election Survey

57

This chapter focuses on various methods of sampling and focus on the technique, which should be used for selecting the voters for the pre-poll surveys and exit poll. It will also address the sampling issues and concerns related with opinion polling during elections and try to demystify the misconceptions and myths surrounding it. This chapter is divided into three sections: The first section explains the term sampling and the various methods of sample selection. This helps in providing a perspective for comparatively analyzing the sampling methods used for measuring voting behavior in India. The focus would be on discussing the probability and non-probability sampling methods and the various techniques that are used for sampling the respondents. A few refined and sophisticated sampling techniques would also be discussed. The second section deals with the ways of selecting an appropriate sampling method for a survey and determining the right sample size. The sample size and distribution is important as it determines the quantum of the adequate sample and the levels of precision required for the survey. The sampling error in any survey depends upon the size of the sample and it becomes pertinent to find out the levels of sampling error that may be treated as reasonable. It will also probe whether a sample can be truly representative of the universe of the study and it becomes unrepresentative then what are the methods by which it can be corrected and balanced. This section also tries to find answers to the contentious issues of sampling methods and sample adequacy that is raised for elections surveys in India and the final section will discuss in detail the methods of sampling popularly used in election surveys in India for measuring voting behavior. It analyzes the methods of sampling used for pre-election surveys and exit polls to find out whether they are same or whether there are visible variations. The sampling methods used by popular opinion polls on elections will be comparatively analyzed on scientific parameters to judge their merits and demerits. This section also details in depth the sampling method used by academic research organizations like CSDS for election surveys to figure out why they are considered to be the more scientific and representative of the electorates.

58

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

Methods of Sampling in Surveys The various methods and techniques of sampling that are employed in survey research can broadly be classified into two categories: probability and non-probability sampling. The method of probability sampling and techniques are as follows:

Probability Sampling Probability sampling as the term denotes is the method of sampling based on the assumption that the possibility of all elements of the population being selected in the sample is equal. Thus everyone in the universe of the study has an equal chance of being selected in the sampling process. An essential requirement for any form of probability sampling is the existence of a sample frame or complete list of the universe to be studied from which the sampled elements can be selected. Within the probability sampling technique, there are different techniques of sampling. Simple random sampling is the most basic form of probability sampling and is the most widely used method of sampling because it is a very simple method. In this sampling technique, any of the possible subsets of elements of the population has an equal chance of being selected in the sample. But in order to draw a simple random sample, obtaining a list of all the eligible units is the key requirement. The advantage of this technique of sampling is that no member of the targeted population have a second chance of selection. The reason behind this is that once selected, the sample does not return to the pool again. However, there is one major disadvantage with this technique, as it does not ensure that the sample selected will be evenly spread. Let us take a simple example; if we need to select 100 voters in a village for conducting the interview from a total of 800 voters in the village/locality using a simple random technique, we would randomly select these 100 voters from different corners of the village. While the selection of voters will be done randomly, without using any bias, there are chances that these 100 voters may



Importance of Scientific Sampling in Election Survey

59

be unrepresentative, may over sample people from some community, may leave people from one region, etc. The chances are that the sample may be unrepresentative in respect of age group, gender, caste community, or even region, though the sample selection was done without using any bias, randomly as the simple random technique suggests. Many studies on voting behavior apply this simple random method for selecting the voters for the interview ending up with a non-representative sample. But in spite of this method, being not the most appropriate method is still being used by various researchers/institutions for studying voting behavior in India. The systematic random sampling technique is similar to the simple random method but a slightly refined version. The sample is selected randomly but not using a simple method but a systematic method. For selecting the sample using the systematic random method, a complete list of all elements of the universe is an essential prerequisite. If we leave out some elements of the universe from the list, those elements will have no chance of being selected in the sample. How does one select the sample using the systematic random sample? The samples are selected at regular intervals and not haphazardly. At what interval the sample should be selected from the list of the universe depends upon the size of the universe and the number of sample which is to be selected. Thus, for example, if we need to select 100 voters in the village from a total of 800 voters listed on the electoral roll in that village, we need to first fix the interval by dividing the total number of voters in that village by the number of voters we want to select in the sample. In this case, it implies that in order to fix the interval we would divide 800 by 100 (800/100 = 8) and the interval at which the voters should be selected for the interview will be 8. In other words, if we need to interview 100 voters in a village which has a total of 800 voters listed on the voter’s list, one should select every eighth voter listed on the voters list. The first voter should be selected randomly between 1 and 8 using the random number table. The sample of voters selected using systematic random sampling

60

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

technique will be representative of the voters of the village and will represent all the groups, caste communities, and locations. The possibility of missing out some elements of the voters’ background variables would be minimum. A further advanced method of probability sampling built upon systematic random sampling is stratified random sampling. This version of the sampling technique selects the sample randomly from different strata of the population and ensures proper representation of the various elements from different strata. Thus if a sample of 10 elements are to be selected from a population of 81 using this technique, then the identification of strata within the group is essential. For example, if the gender breakup shows that there are 30 women and 51 men in this group, then they can be treated as two different strata. The sample of 10 can be picked up from these two strata either proportionately or disproportionately. While in systematic random sampling there is an equal probability of all the elements to be selected in the sample, in a stratified random method the sample ratio can be fixed for different strata proportionately or disproportionately depending upon the requirements of the survey. This method can be extended to various strata of the population that could be two stage, three stage, or even multistage stratification. Probability sampling based on the various randomization methods discussed above works well when the sample frame or list of the universe to be studied is available. Cluster sampling is the best method of sampling in a situation where it is almost impossible to obtain a population list. In this method of sampling, first the clusters or groupings are created, then a sample is selected using the random methods. Thus, for example, if a survey has to be done among the people staying in five star hotels in Delhi, it would be very difficult or almost impossible to get a list of all the people staying in such hotels at a particular period of time. The first stage would be to list down all the five star hotels in Delhi and pick up few hotels randomly. The second stage would be of identifying clusters like different floors of the hotel, single or double occupancy rooms, etc. Once the clusters are selected, people



Importance of Scientific Sampling in Election Survey

61

are either randomly selected or as per convenience. The difference between clustered sampling with stratified sampling is that while in the former clusters are natural units, in the latter the stratum is artificially created.

Non-probability Sampling In this sampling category, the probability of the members of the population being selected is not equal. The probability of selection of some subsets of population can be higher, lower, or even nil. Thus the sample selected from the non-probability method always has the danger of over or underrepresentation of some elements of the population. There are different kinds of non-probability sampling techniques with convenience sampling being one of them. A convenience sampling technique is used in which the sample is selected only from among those people who are easily and readily available for interviews. The sample selected by this technique does not ensure whether it would be representative, but in some circumstances like lack of financial resources and time constraints, it can be the most suitable method of sampling. One more method of non-probability sampling that is used in special circumstances is termed as snowball sampling. As the word signifies, as a snowball keeps on growing as it rolls along similarly, the small sample selected gets expanded and enlarged as the survey goes on. A snowball sample is one in which the sample is selected based on the reference and addresses given by respondents who could be contacted and interviewed. This technique becomes important when there are no lists available and there are no other ways in which the targeted respondents can be sampled. If research is to be conducted among people with special characteristics or skills who could not be located by any list, then the contact details given by those who belong to this group could be used to conduct further interviews. This can be repeated till the desired number of people is interviewed for the survey. Another method of the non-probability sampling technique that is quite frequently

62

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

used is called quota sampling. In this sampling technique, the population to be studied is divided into different subgroups and then sampled in different proportions for different subgroups. For example, the population can be divided into subgroups like male and female, young and old, etc. A quota is fixed for each of the groups that are not proportionate to each other but are representative of the actual demographics. In this method, the probability of each unit being selected in the sample is unequal which sometimes makes the sample completely skewed. The non-probability sampling method is also used for conducting focus group interviews. The sample selection is subjective based on the convenience and availability of the respondents. In such surveys, a small number of people say 10 to 20 are interviewed in a group discussion pattern on any subject for a much longer time. These are some of the broad techniques of sampling that are mostly used in sample surveys and opinion polls but it is not comprehensive and complete. There are some other sampling methods that are based primarily on the techniques discussed above, but they are more refined and are generally used for more sophisticated research. The probability proportionate to size (PPS) sampling technique is an improved version of the systematic random sampling technique that is used when the units from which the sample is to be selected are of unequal size. Unequal sized subgroups have unequal probability of being selected in the sample. The chances are that bigger units may not be sampled proportionately and there are higher chances of smaller units being selected. The PPS technique ensures greater probability of the larger units to be selected proportionately in the sample. Another kind of sampling that is used for survey designs where data are collected in more than one stage is called multistage sampling. A sample set is selected and the data are collected for the whole set. In the second stage of data collection, a subset of sample is selected from the original sample and the data are collected only from the subsample. If the survey demands that the data need to be collected once again, a smaller sample is selected from the subsample used in the second phase. Thus if the sample is drawn more than once in



Importance of Scientific Sampling in Election Survey

63

different stages from the same sample set, the method of sampling is termed as multistage sampling.

Selecting Sampling Method and Sample Distribution The sampling methods and techniques discussed in the earlier section reveal that there is no omnibus method that can be applied for all kinds of survey research. The choice of sampling technique for any survey depends upon a multitude of factors like the availability of the sampling frame, expertise, and resources.

Selection of the Right Sampling Technique The right choice of the sampling technique for a survey where the sampling frame is available can be done by pre-testing the various available techniques. The pre-testing of the sampling technique will be explained by an illustration. For example, we are interested in conducting a research to find out the average number of days school children remained absent from a class of 81 students with the help of a sample survey of 24 students. In this case, we know in advance that the average number of absenteeism per student is 6.69 days. There is a list of universe that provides the following information: First there are 81 students in the class with unique identity numbers starting from 1 to 81 and Second the number of days each student has remained absent from the school. Now let us find out whether simple random or systematic random sampling is the more appropriate method for this survey. As seen in Table 4.1, a sample of 24 students was drawn from the list of 81 by the simple random method with the help of the random number table. While selecting the sample from random number table, care was taken that the student whose ID number was less than 81 were selected and the same number was not picked up more than once. For knowing the average number of days students were absent, the total number of days all the 24 students were absent were added which came to 139. This was then divided

64

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

Table 4.1. Simple Random Sampling Method Student ID 3

No. of days absent

Student ID

No. of days absent

Student ID

No. of days absent

1

33

4

74

5

3

15 47

4

32 1

50

15

69

48

1

14

6

78 7

4

15 13

Source: Authors.

15 58 54

14 0 5 1 1 9 4

40 53 21 37

5 3 5 5

24

10

42

9

59

3

by 24 and the figure arrived was 5.79 days. The average number of absent days (5.79 days) calculated using this sampling technique is much lower than the actual average of 6.69 absent days. Thus the sample selected through the simple random method is not representative of the students. So we can conclude that this is not the right and appropriate method of sampling for this study. Now let us use the systematic random sampling technique for drawing the sample. A sample of 24 students was drawn from the list of 81 students as Table 4.2 reveals. The first step was to divide 81 by 24 that come to 3.37 which is the sampling constant. Twentyfour students were systematically selected using the interval. For knowing the average number of days students were absent, the total number of days all the 24 students were absent were added which came to 170. This was then divided by 24 and the figure arrived was 7.0 days. The average number of absent days (7.0 days) calculated from this sampling method is much closer to the actual average of 6.69 absent days. Thus the sample selected through the systematic random method is more or less representative of the students and is the right and appropriate method of sampling for this study. This illustration clearly shows that for choosing the



65

Importance of Scientific Sampling in Election Survey

Table 4.2. Systematic Random Sampling Technique Student ID 2

No. of days absent

Student ID

No. of days absent

Student ID

No. of days absent

1

32

14

59

3

39

16

45

7

1

5 8

2

12 15

1 1

18

11

25

11

22

Source: Authors.

1

28 35 42 49 52

3 1 9 6

11

55 62

4 9

66

10

72

10

79

18

69 76

5

15

right method, the sampling technique is to pre-test and find out how close it approximates with the elements of the universe of the study. However, this is not possible in every case and sampling experts and the statistician’s advice should be solicited for selecting the right sampling methods and techniques for any survey or opinion poll.

Deciding Sample Size and Distribution The appropriate size of the sample and its distribution depends upon a lot of factors and there is no single formula that can determine it. The factors that are taken into account while deciding the size of the sample is a combination of both technical and nontechnical. The technical aspect is the quantum of sampling error that will be tolerated and the precision levels aimed by the survey. The size of the universe of study is also a key factor in determining the size of the sample. If the universe is small, then statistical tables can be consulted in fixing the sample sizes that are statistically significant. But if the population is big, then a sample size needs to be fixed taking into account the resources available and

66

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

the feasibility. The other aspect for fixing the sample size depends upon the objective of the survey and the smallest subgroups at which the data is to be collected. The heterogeneity of the universe also decides the size of the sample. If the unit of analysis is at the macro-level, then a somewhat smaller sample would be enough. But if the survey aims at analyzing data at a disaggregated or microlevel, then a bigger sample would be required. But it should be borne in mind that in any survey, the sample size is heavily dependent on the aims of the survey and the proposed unit of analysis. Popular national level opinion polls held by market research agencies and pollsters in India cannot follow the statistical tables to determine the size of the sample but have to go by the fixed number calculated at the cost involved per sample and the level of analysis. Thus if one wants to know the popularity of the Indian Prime Minister (PM) Manmohan Singh, the size of the sample cannot be calculated in percentage terms or through statistical tables. Thus a sample size of 1,500 would be adequate enough to rate his popularity at an all India level. But if the requirement is to find out the PM’s popularity in different states of India, then a sample of around 15,000 would be needed. The reason is that there are 28 states and five union territories (UT) in India and a minimum sample of 500 will be required for all the states and UTs to make a fair and robust assessment. A unique feature of survey research is that surveys from a sample drawn from the same population will be wary of each other and also from the demographic figures because of chance. Thus if two surveys are conducted on the same sample and at the same time, the data collected will not be the same but have significant variations. This variation is termed as sampling errors and the statistical measures that are used to estimate it are called standard errors. Standard errors are reported with survey findings to show how close the sample estimates were to the true population and the precision levels of the survey. Table 4.3 shows the sample sizes necessary to make survey estimates, the size of population and the sample required for it, and three levels of sampling error (see Table 4.3).



Importance of Scientific Sampling in Election Survey

67

Table 4.3. Sample Size and Distribution at Three Levels of Precision for 95 percent Confidence Level

Population Size

Sampling Error +3

Sampling Error +5

Sampling Error + 10

50/50 Split

80/20 Split

50/50 Split

80/20 Split

50/50 Split

80/20 Split

250

203

183

152

124

70

49

750

441

358

254

185

100 500

1,000 2,500 5,000

10,000

92

341 516 748 880 964

25,000

1,023

1,00,000

1,056

50,000

10,00,000

100,000,000

1,045 1,066 1,067

87

289 406 537 601 639 665 674 678 682 683

80

217 278 333 357 370 378 381 383 384 384

Source: Salant, P. and Dillman, D.A. (1994).

71

165 198 224 234 240 244 245 245 246 246

49 81 85 88 93 94 95 96 96 96 96 96

38 55 57 58 60 61 61 61 61 61 61 61

Sampling Errors and Ways to Correct It The aim of any sampling method is to draw a sample that is as close to the actual characteristics of the population of the study and mirror the representative of demographic profile. In spite of using the most accurate sampling technique and the best of fieldwork, the completed survey sample can never be 100 percent representative. The reason for not getting a truly representative sample is not due to sampling techniques but mainly because of the sample frame and practical difficulties arising during fieldwork. What can be the potential problem in the sampling frame? The problems are: (a) missing elements. There may be some elements that could be missing from the sample frame that obliterates their

68

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

chances of being getting selected in the sample. Thus care should be taken to find out the missing elements in the sample frame which are difficult sometimes; (b) there could be clusters in the sample frame which are not identified during sampling resulting in unrepresentative sample. In spite of proper cautions, sometimes the clusters in the sample frame are difficult to be ascertained; (c) the possibilities of blank or foreign elements in the sample frame. Blank elements selected during sampling increase the nonresponse errors in survey. Similarly foreign elements that should not have been in the sampling frame also increase this risk; and (d) the presence of duplicate elements in the sample frame. If there are duplicate elements in the sample list and they are selected it increases the sampling error of the survey. Apart from the problems in the sample frame, the element of non-contact with respondents and non-response during the survey also becomes a major problem. Any survey conducted on the basis of the pre-drawn samples has a higher possibility of noncontact that simply means non-availability of sampled respondents. The reason for non-contact can be due to many reasons, but internal migration is one of the biggest reasons for large numbers of non-contacts of the respondents during survey in India. The non-contact of some sections of the population certainly distorts the picture of the actual sample in spite of drawing the best sample. Similarly the problem of non-response has become a major problem in survey research not only in the first world countries but also in India. The number of sampled respondents who are unwilling to be interviewed has gone up during the last few years. Thus both non-contact and non-response of the sampled respondents increase the non-response errors in the survey and also affect the representativeness of the sample. This raises a logical question: What needs to be done if the sample after the survey reveals that it is not representative? Is there a way out or additional fieldwork needs to be done to correct the imbalance? The answer to this lies in the standard practices and protocols that are used by survey research all over the world. After the data collection of the survey is over, the data are electronically



Importance of Scientific Sampling in Election Survey

69

entered and analyzed to check whether the sample is representative or not. If the sample is found to be skewed, then the imbalance is corrected by adjusting the proportion of different elements in the sample as per the actual demographics. The method of balancing the proportion of different elements in the sample is known in survey research as assigning “weights.” Weights are used to assign greater relative value or importance to some sampled elements as compared to others in the survey.

Methods of Sampling Used in Election Surveys The sampling method of election surveys in India is the core of criticisms both among common people as well as survey experts. The common man criticizes the election survey on the grounds that a small size sample cannot measure the voting behavior of the electorates accurately. However, this does not hold much ground as the science of statistics say that it is feasible. Statisticians believe that a reasonable and accurate assessment can be made about the voting intentions and behavior of the electorates from a small sample of voters. This can be possible if the sample drawn for the survey is scientific and representative of the total voters. A simple method for getting a representative sample of voters in India is by the randomization method which allows every voter in the electorate to have an equal chance of being selected in the sample. Thus the size of the sample is not the reason for the failure of election surveys as statistically it is possible to do an accurate survey based even on a small sample. On the other hand, experts criticize that the sampling method used in election surveys is neither scientific nor it is done using the randomization technique which they feel is the most suitable method. Media opinion polls are censured by the experts for using purposive sampling method where the voters are selected based on quotas fixed for them making the sample skewed and erroneous. The questions raised about election surveys in India and its criticisms will be addressed by probing the sampling methods and

70

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

processes used by polling organizations. The purpose is to analyze the sampling techniques and assess the steps and processes taken in selecting the final sample of voters. This will help in finding out the sampling flaws and errors if any and steps needed to iron them out. Before the quota sampling method is analyzed, it would be relevant to find out if the sampling method employed is totally purposive or is at only some stages. The sampling technique used for opinion polls on election is based on the multi-stratified sampling technique that is used by most of the polling organizations. This involves three stages of sampling that are: (a) the first strata or stage of sampling is at the parliamentary/assembly constituency level. Most of the election surveys either use random or systematic random techniques for sampling at this stage. Both the process of randomization is scientifically correct, though systematic random sampling has an advantage as it provides a better spread of the sample. At this stage, academic organization like CSDS follows the practice of drawing out three or four samples that are checked whether they properly represent the parties at the national/state proportionally in terms of their actual votes share and seats won in the previous election. The sample which closely reflects the proportionate votes shares and seats won by the main political parties in the last elections is selected; (b) the second strata or stage involves the sampling of the polling stations from the assembly constituencies already sampled. At this stage also the polling stations are selected using either the random or systematic random methods for sampling; and (c) the third strata or stage of sampling that is used for selecting the voters for the study is at the final stages of selecting the sample of voters that two different methods of sampling are followed. Media opinion polls follow a method of quota sampling based on randomization, whereas CSDS follows systematic random sampling for selecting the voters from the voters lists provided by Election Commission of India. A comparative analysis of these two methods of sampling the voters at the final stage of sampling would reveal whether the process is scientific and full or is it erroneous and leads to high sampling errors.



Importance of Scientific Sampling in Election Survey

71

Systematic Random Sampling of Voters For election surveys, CSDS follows the method of systematic random sampling for selecting voters. Respondents are selected from the electoral rolls of the selected polling stations using the systematic random sampling technique with a random start. In each sampled polling station, a list of sampled respondents is prepared containing their name, age, gender, and address. The sampling is done before the fieldwork begins which minimizes the chances of errors that may occur during fieldwork to a great extent. The process of sampling is quite simple and the respondents are easily selected. The first voter will be randomly selected from the voter list with a number less than the sampling constant using a random number table. Here “randomly” refers to an absolute non-bias approach with no inclination or preference for selecting the voters. For example, if 20 voters are to be sampled in a polling station where the total electorate is 1,400, then 1,400 will be divided by 20 to arrive at a sampling constant or interval which in this case is 70. The next step would be to add the sampling constant to the first voter number sampled in order to arrive at the next voter. If the first randomly sampled voter’s number is 55 (which is less than 70), then 70 is added to it to get the second voter. The second randomly sampled voter would be 125 in this case (55 + 70 = 125). This process will be repeated till 20 voters are selected from the electoral roll of the sampled polling station. The sample profile achieved using this method for election surveys has been quite representative of the electorates. The election surveys conducted by CSDS both at the national level and at state level elections have revealed that the sample profile has been a close reflection of the characteristic of the voters of most of the surveys.

Quota Sampling of Voters Quota sampling on the other hand is mostly done by market research agencies and media house in India and the process by

72

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

which it is done is never revealed in public realm. As the word suggests a pre-determined quota is fixed for conducting the survey of voters based on gender and differential age groups. The estimation is based on the census figures for both national and state level election surveys. An illustration of the process of quota sampling will be done to find out whether the technique is correct or not and what are the shortcomings associated with it. The sampling processes under this method are as follows: Step I The process of selection of households 1) The investigator on reaching the sampled polling station locates the first post office/post box from the main approach road. After locating the post office/post box the household in front/right side of the enumerator is the first sampled household for conducting the interview. 2) After conducting the interview in the first sampled household, the enumerators visit every 10th household on the right side of the first sampled household for conducting the interview and this process is followed till the required numbers of interviews are completed. Step II The order in which the voters are sampled 1) In the first sampled house, the investigator should try to conduct an interview of a male in the first age group, i.e., in the age group of 14 to 30 years. If no male member is available in the household in the first age group, then the interview of a female falling in this age group should be conducted. A tick mark (√) should be put in the appropriate box in the quota grid after selecting the respondent. 2) In the second sampled house, the interview of the respondent will depend on whether the interview in the first household was of male or female in the first age group. If the interview in the first household was of a male in the first age group,



Importance of Scientific Sampling in Election Survey

73

i.e., in the age group of 14 to 30 years, then an interview of a female falling in this age group should be completed. Or if the interview in the first household was of female in the age group of 14 to 30 years, then the interview of a male member in the first age group should be done. A tick mark (√) should be put in the appropriate box in the quota grid after selecting the respondent. 3) Then in the third sampled house, an interview of a male in the second age group, i.e., in the age group of 31 to 59 years should be conducted. If no male member is available in the household in the second age group, then the interview of a female member falling in this age group should be done. A tick mark (√) should be put in the appropriate box in the quota grid after selecting the respondent. 4) Following the same order, the interview of the respondent in the fourth household will depend on whether the interview in the third household was of a male or female in the second age group. If the interview in the third household was of a male in the second age group, i.e., in the age group of 31 to 59 years, then an interview of female falling in this age group should be conducted. Or if the interview in the third household was of a female in the age group of 31 to 59 years, then the interview of a male member in the second age group should be done. A tick mark (√) should be put in the appropriate box in the quota grid after selecting the respondent. 5) This order and method of selecting respondents is repeated on the basis of gender and age groups’ quota fixed to complete the required interviews at every polling station. Thus quota sampling involves systematic steps for sampling with randomization in selecting both the households and voters (see Table 4.4). The illustration on the quota sampling clearly shows that it is a very careful and rigorous procedure to follow the quota of interviews required at all the sampling points. In the illustrative case, quotas are fixed only on the basis of gender and age group but if caste community quotas are also added to the

74

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

Table 4.4. Grid for Quota Sampling of Voters No. 1.

Group

14 to 30 years

2

31 to 59 years

3.

60 years & above

Quota M

1

2

3

Total

F

M F

M F

Total Number of Interviews Completed at the Polling Station = Source: Authors.

quota grid it will become more complex and difficult to follow it. Thus the chances of strictly following quota sampling during fieldwork is not practically feasible resulting in large scale sampling errors and other errors. This process also leaves the decision of the sampling process on the enumerator that often leads to high non-sampling error during the process of data collection. Thus the sample collected using this method in most of the surveys becomes unrepresentative and inaccurate. Thus the opinion of experts that quota sampling techniques used by media opinion polls on elections have inherent flaws and errors does not hold much ground as the problem lies elsewhere. The problem mainly lies in the actual implementation of quota sampling at the fieldwork level that needs to be sorted out with better randomization procedures and protocols.

5 Questionnaire, an Important Tool for Collecting Information

Like in any survey research, a structured interview schedule popularly referred to as “Questionnaire” is an essential tool for collecting data for measuring voting behavior. Questionnaire or interview schedule is a written document in which various questions are written in a clearly worded format on the topics which the survey aims to probe and enquire. For a study aimed at analyzing voting, the questionnaire or the interview schedule will have questions aimed at collecting information about the political choices, likes and dislikes about political parties, and similar such questions. Besides sampling, a good questionnaire is a key to how accurately one can measure voting behavior since the accuracy of this measurement depends largely upon the quality of the data. If the data which have been collected is inaccurate, there is nothing that can be done to improve the accuracy of the measurement of voting behavior. Here the quality of data does not refer to the sample size but to a few things which determine the quality of the answers. The quality of answers in return is determined by the following parameters related to interview schedules or questionnaires: • First it relates to designing of the questions, how were the questions designed? • How were the questions worded? • How was the question on voting asked from the respondents?

76

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

• What was the sequence in which these questions were placed in the questionnaire? • In what sequence were these questions asked to the respondent? • What was the language in which the questions were asked from the respondents? • How did the investigator ask these questions? • Did the respondent understand these questions correctly and did he answer those questions correctly? • How did the investigator record those answers? A structured questionnaire or interview schedule is required for data collection for measuring voting behavior to ensure standardization. It is desirable that in the process of data collection, all the questions should be communicated to most of the respondents in a similar manner and should convey a similar meaning. This is possible only if the questions are written, clearly worded, and simple. One may not need an interview schedule or a questionnaire if the effort for measuring voting behavior is done not by the survey method but by a constituency level study. A standard questionnaire is needed for data collection for measuring voting behavior which involves interviewing a large number of voters, to maintain uniformity in approach and communication. Standardization minimizes errors in survey and ensures that the data collected are credible and free from measurement errors. Standard and semi-structured questionnaires are used for measuring voting behavior and attitudes in India. The popular belief among people is that election surveys in India are conducted with questionnaires that are neither properly formulated nor have questions that are empirically tested and tried. The election survey questionnaires are designed by polling agencies that suit the information required by the clients and have commercial value for the media. This may be true in some cases, but it is not a correct reflection of the election polling industry in India. The questionnaire/interview schedule used for face-to-face interviews of voters during opinion polls is generally written and systematically



Questionnaire, an Important Tool for Collecting Information

77

formatted. Designing a good questionnaire is an art that is perfected after conducting extensive survey research and development. A good questionnaire is a mix of freshly formulated questions and questions already existing in the knowledge domain. Questionnaire designing is a lengthy and cumbersome process as it involves brainstorming sessions for formulating questions and conducting field trials for checking its efficacy and relevancy. The draft questionnaire design undergoes a series of pre-tests and based on the feedback from the respondents, it is revised and finalized for conducting the survey. This chapter is divided into three broad sections: The first section explains the basic parameters that need to be followed in framing a good questionnaire for measuring voting behavior and attitudes. The focus would be on providing the broad contours for framing election survey questions with relevant examples and illustrations. The purpose would be to differentiate and distinguish between good and bad questions. A brief sketch of technical survey terms and jargons that should be avoided while designing the questionnaire would also be outlined; the second section deals with the different types of classification of question structures like open ended, close with ordered answer variables, close-ended and unordered answer variables, and partially close-ended questions. There is no thumb rule for selecting any particular type of question structure for an election survey and it depends upon the kind of information that it aims to gather. Examples will be used to show that for a particular kind of information certain question structures are more suitable and best suited. The final section deals with the importance of pre-testing the questionnaire and checking the efficacy of questions before it is finalized for computing the voting behavior of the electorates. It will outline the stages of pre-testing which a questionnaire should ideally undergo and why each stage is necessary for designing a good election survey questionnaire. Pre-test of the questionnaire helps in finding out how the survey questions were understood and responded to by the sampled voters and based on the feedback, inconsistencies, flaws, and errors can be identified and ironed out.

78

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

Basics of a Good Questionnaire The foundation for survey research lay in identifying the problem that motivates a survey in the first place and then translating the problem or idea into good questions that respondents can understand and answer objectively. Social scientists call it operationalizing. That means setting up categories of events or phenomena that can be observed and measured (Salant and Dillman, 1994). A good questionnaire is not one that contains questions written in grammatically correct language nor does it mean a document designed aesthetically and in stylized format. A question is considered good in survey research when it conveys the same meaning and is understood by all the respondents in more or less the same way. A question understood by different people in different ways would certainly be a poor question. The other element that qualifies the question to be good is the ability to get different answers from different people. A question that gets only one kind of response is not considered a good question and in survey parlance it is called “The question was wasted.” If a question asked from the respondents gets more than 95 percent responses of one kind, it is considered a bad question. So while collecting information for measuring voting behavior, the questions which we need to ask should be such which communicate the same meaning to almost all the respondents. A good quality election survey questionnaire can be formulated by the following parameters.

Use of Simple and Common Words A good questionnaire for an election survey aimed at measuring voting behavior would be one that contains questions written in a simple manner and in the common language. The questions should be such that if they are asked to the voters, they should easily understand it, and there should not be any need for further explanation for those questions. The questions should be written in the language spoken by the people and its wording should not



Questionnaire, an Important Tool for Collecting Information

79

be very formal and bookish. When the question is asked to the voter, it should clearly communicate to the person the intent of what is being asked. The effort should be to use as far as possible simple words and words that are popularly used by people in dayto-day conversation. Normally the questions are formulated in one language, but at times there may be a need for mixing words from other languages due to linguistic acceptability of certain English words in Indian languages which are more commonly used than the native language words. For example, in formulating an election survey questionnaire in Hindi, some English words like MP or MLA or Elections are incorporated as they are more popularly used by common people in Hindi-speaking areas of India than the Hindi words like, Saansad, Vidhayak, or Chunaav.

Length of Questions Should Be Short There is a general consensus among survey researchers that the questions should be short and lengthy questions should be avoided as far as possible. However, it is contested by some experts who believe lengthy questions are more suitable and in some situations it is very crucial. The argument put forward in favor of lengthy questions is that introducing the questions in a few sentences before the actual question begins helps in placing the respondent in a better situation. The lengthy question also allows the respondent a little more time to think about the answer and provide better responses. Thus long questions are useful and desirable in some situations but it should be used sparingly in the questionnaire. The reasons for avoiding long questions arise: too many lengthy questions make the questionnaire bulky and very time consuming and it leads to respondent fatigue and a higher rate of incomplete interviews during the survey. However, lengthy questions are useful or rather unavoidable if the election survey questions are to measure the opinion of the voters on politically sensitive issues like religious riots and electoral polarization. The questions on sensitive issues need to be

80

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

framed in a contextual/situational frame that makes them necessarily lengthy. Such sensitive questions if asked in short would be most likely to be seen as intrusive or embarrassing to the voters and will not solicit the right answers. Thus questions to respondents like accepting liquor or cash for voting for a particular candidate or political party would fall in the category of sensitive questions. If sensitive questions are asked in a direct or straightforward way, it becomes uncomfortable for the voters to answer such questions leading to high non-response rates. It is useful to formulate sensitive questions in a longer format to neutralize the value judgments attached with it like there is nothing good or bad about the question. It also allows the respondent to have a better recall of the situation and provides a little more time to answer the questions. For example: Inappropriate Formulation: For whom did you vote during the recently concluded Assembly Elections? Did you get any gift or money or similar such thing from any candidate during the recently concluded Assembly Elections? Appropriate Formulation: While talking to the people in this locality, we found out that some people voted while some people were not able to vote, what about you, were you able to vote or not? While talking to the people in this locality, we came to know that some voters receive gifts or money from the candidates during the recently concluded Assembly Elections, while some did not receive any gift or any money. What about you, did you receive any gift or money during the recently concluded Assembly Elections? Similarly, questions on computing the electorate’s opinion on socially undesirable issues are also lengthy as they are framed in a desirable context. These questions on socially undesirable behavior or attitudes if addressed directly to the voters and in a short version usually do not yield correct answers as people tend to avoid them. Thus voters may have indulged in some form of malpractices during the election but when asked about it in a straightforward way, they do not give correct answers. So, when writing questions on such issues, care should be taken that the main question



Questionnaire, an Important Tool for Collecting Information

81

is prefaced with a small narrative to tone down its undesirability and awkwardness. This helps in getting a more accurate response compared to what one can get if such questions were asked in a straight forward manner.

Avoid Writing Two Questions in One While formulating survey questions, one should always avoid writing two questions in one question. For example, Do you like Rahul Gandhi and Sonia Gandhi? This looks like asking a question or expressing opinion on leadership, but the problem in this question is that this question has two questions in one question. While the first question is about the choice of Rahul Gandhi, the other question is about Sonia Gandhi. At times it may be difficult for the respondent to give a clear-cut answer to this type of question. One may not like Rahul Gandhi as a leader but may like the leadership of Sonia Gandhi. If the question is worded like this, it may be very difficult for the respondent to give a clear answer to this question. The respondent does not have the choice of giving a positive answer for one and negative answer for the other. So if the answer to this question is recorded in the affirmative, it implies that the respondent likes both the leaders. On the contrary, if the answer is recorded in the negative it means the respondent neither likes Rahul Gandhi nor Sonia Gandhi which may not be correct. The respondent may like one and dislike the other, but questions of this kind do not help in getting a clear-cut answer from the respondent. Such unclear answers will result in measuring voting behavior which may be unreliable. This is called a “Doublebarreled” question that must be completely avoided in any survey questionnaire.

Questions with Clear Time Reference Election survey questionnaires have some questions that try to measure the opinion of the voters with reference to some time

82

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

reference. Any question that refers to a time period should clearly mention the exact period whether in days, months, or years depending upon the issues for which the reference is being made, so that different respondents do not interpret the time period in different ways. Thus the last few years can be interpreted by some respondents as one or two years while others may understand it as four or five years. This is against the basic principle of standardization and should be strictly avoided. The question should clearly state as to what is the time period for which this question is being referred and that would be possible only if it is clearly spelled out in the question in exact years. The time reference in the question should be adequate as a very long time recall is not suitable for survey questions. In case of very long time references, the respondent fails to recall clearly the issue or the event that took place a long time ago. Thus a longer time reference becomes a memory testing exercise for the respondent and their responses are often vague or inaccurate. Inappropriate Formulation: During the last few years how many times has the MLA of your area visited your village/town/city? Appropriate Formulation: During the last one year how many times has the MLA of your area visited your village/town/city? The question that is asked in reference to a time period could be more appropriate and accurate if it is asked with a specific time reference or with the help of some landmark or by providing some cues.

Answer Categories Should Follow the Question While measuring voting behavior, we do ask questions on which it is difficult for the voter to give an answer in either “Yes” or “No” and at times voters give subjective or qualified responses. While formulating such questions, where answers may not be given in either yes or no, it is desirable that some answer categories which are likely to be the response of the voter should be read out along with the question. If the answer categories need to be read out, it



Questionnaire, an Important Tool for Collecting Information

83

should form part of the question. But there is one caution, these answer categories should follow the questions, which is to say that the questions should be written in such a way that first the question should be read out and the answer categories should be read out later. This sequencing helps the respondent in first listening to the question and then choosing the possible answer from various answer categories that was read out. Inappropriate Formulation: Would you say that you are satisfied to a great extent, to some extent, not much or not at all with the performance of the state government? Appropriate Formulation: To what extent are you satisfied with the performance of the state government—to a great extent, to some extent, not much or not at all?

Specific Questions Should Be Preferred While asking questions for measuring voting behavior, specific questions should be preferred over general questions. General and vague questions are prone to inappropriate interpretations, different interpretations resulting in giving different meaning to the question by different voters. If different voters attach different meaning to the same question, it would go against the basic principle of standardization in survey research. When voters will attach different meaning to the same question, they are bound to give different responses to the same questions resulting in analysis being inaccurate. The measurement of voting behavior based on data collected by faulty questions is bound to be questionable. The questions with wide range of interpretations by the voters invoke the risk of higher margins of measurement errors. Thus a question on the performance of the central government in India would be open for various kinds of interpretation by different voters. Some may interpret the performance in terms of basic amenities provided while others may interpret it on the parameters of handling terror attacks and law and order in the country. In order to minimize the possibility of various

84

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

interpretations by different respondents for the same question, it is essential that the question should be specific in nature and clear in its intent. Inappropriate Formulation: How would you rate the performance of the central government—very good, good, not so good or bad? Appropriate Formulation: How would you rate the performance of the government on the issue of handling the problem of unemployment—very good, good, not so good or bad?

Avoid Double Negative In the Question While designing an election survey questionnaire, negatively worded questions and double negatives should be avoided as far as possible since it creates confusion not only among the voters but also among the field enumerators. For example, “Voting in elections should not be made compulsory and non-voters should not be punished.” Tell me if you agree or disagree with the following statement? The problem in this question is that the negative answer is the positive response while the positive response is the negative answer. Though questions with double negative should be avoided, some survey experts feel that a few such questions should be purposively incorporated in the questionnaire as it helps the respondents in being more attentive and also breaks the interview monotony. The double negative question is especially useful for the battery of questions where with one single question more than one question is asked from the respondent one by one without a break. The responses are recorded either in agree or in disagree format (positive or negative). If in such a battery all the statements are written in a positive manner, then the respondent tends to provide one set of answers to all the questions that may be either positive or negative. This is referred to as “Response Set.” Mixing of positive and negative statements in the battery of statements is very useful in breaking this response set of the respondents even at the cost of investigators having to pay little more attention while recording answers to these double negative questions. But the number of



Questionnaire, an Important Tool for Collecting Information

85

such questions in the battery should be few or else it will lead to confusion among the enumerators as well as the respondents.

Prefer Forced Choice Questions In an election survey, there are questions which measure the opinion and attitudes of the electorate in agree–disagree answer categories. The questions are asked in the form of a statement and the voters respond to it by either agreeing or disagreeing with them. Survey experience reveals that quite often the voters agree or disagree to two statements that are quite contradictory to each other. This is quite common among illiterate voters or those who have low levels of educational attainments. They tend to give one kind of response irrespective of the statements. This in survey parlance is termed as “Acquiescence Bias” and it can be minimized in a survey by providing forced choice questions. Inappropriate Formulations: Voting should be made compulsory in India—do you agree or disagree? Only educated people should be allowed to contest elections—do you agree or disagree? Appropriate Formulation: I am going to read out two statements, tell me whether you agree with statement 1 or statement 2. Statement 1 Voting should be made compulsory since this will help in increasing the voting turnout in India. Statement 2 In a democracy like India people should have the freedom to decide whether they would like to vote or not, voting should not be made compulsory. Statement 1 Only educated people should be allowed to contest elections in India since only educated people can run the government in India. Statement 2 In a democracy like India everybody should have the freedom to contest elections and there should not be any educational qualification for contesting elections.

86

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

Avoid Recency Effects While asking questions for collection of data, there are questions, where few answer categories are read out and the voter is expected to choose one of those answer categories. The responses are not shown to the voters but are read out by the investigator to which the voters listen. The voter has to choose one of the answer responses. Research over the years has indicated that in such situations, for such questions, there is a tendency amongst the voters of choosing either the first response or the last response which is read out to him. The respondent tends to remember or recall these two types of answer responses more than other responses. In survey research, this is known as Primacy or Recency effects. When there is the tendency of the respondent to pick up the first response more often, it is regarded as the primacy effect, and if the respondent picks up the last answer category, it is known as the recency effect. To minimize this problem, while formulating questions it is desirable that the answer response which is more popular compared to other responses should be placed neither at the beginning nor at the end; such responses are to be placed in the middle of the list of responses. This helps in softening the primacy or the recency effect and minimizing its effect (see Table 5.1). Example: Who among the following do you think have been the greatest political leader of India? Table 5.1. Minimizing Primacy and Recency Effect: Basic Rules (Inappropriate Sequence)

(Appropriate Sequence)

2.  V.P. Singh

2.  Sardar Patel

1.  Mahatma Gandhi 3.  Indira Gandhi 4.  Sardar Patel

5.  Lal Bahadur Shastri

6.  Subhas Chandra Bose 7.  Jawahar Lal Nehru Source: Authors.

1.  V.P. Singh

3.  Mahatma Gandhi

4.  Jawahar Lal Nehru 5.  Indira Gandhi

6.  Lal Bahadur Shastri

7.  Subhas Chandra Bose



Questionnaire, an Important Tool for Collecting Information

87

The first formulation of the questions may invite both primacy and recency effects since the two most popular leaders Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru have been placed at the beginning and at the end of the list. A large number of respondents would pick up one of these two answer responses since they are popular. Their names would be mentioned either at the beginning or at the end which makes it easier for the voter to remember. There would be only a few who would mention the name of V.P. Singh. We may not get the correct estimate of what proportion of voters consider these leaders as the greatest political leader of India. Analysis of voting behavior and political choices based on such responses would certainly be unreliable. It may be appropriate to place them somewhere in the middle of the list to minimize the primacy and the recency effect on this question. The revised formulation where Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru have been placed in the middle of the list helps in minimizing the primacy and recency effect on this question. This would help in getting the response closer to the actual reality.

Other Issues The list of parameters to be followed for designing survey questions as outlined above is a comprehensive list but there are other issues that need to be kept in mind while designing a good questionnaire. An important issue is of providing answer categories of “Do not know” or “No opinion” in all the questions. There would be questions that the respondent would not like to answer due to the following reasons: First the respondent could not understand the questions so did not have an answer, second the respondent understood the question but did not have the awareness/knowledge of the issue, and finally the respondent understood the question and has an opinion on the issue but does not want to express his opinion. In order to capture these kinds of situations, all the questions should have an explicit “Do not know” or “No opinion” answer categories. If we do not leave an option of No Opinion for the voters to mention and for the investigator to record, the proportion of other answers

88

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

would get inflated resulting in inaccurate measurement of voting behavior. An important issue in questionnaire designing is sequencing or ordering of the survey questions. Which question is to be asked in the beginning of the questionnaire and which is to be asked at the end should be selected very carefully. As a general rule the first question should be close ended with no more than two or three answer choices. A yes/no format works well. The second or third question should be open ended (Salant and Dillman, 1994). The general agreement among survey practitioners is that sensitive questions should not be asked in the beginning or at the end but should be placed somewhere in the middle of the questionnaire. If possible the questionnaire should be so designed that the respondent has the scope of giving the answer to sensitive questions in a secret manner that may not be heard or known by people present at the time of interview. In election surveys, the voting question is very sensitive and voters want to maintain the secrecy about their vote. Since the interviews are conducted in a face-to-face situation and few people gather around the voters being interviewed, the question on voting should always be asked in such a way which enables voters maintain the secrecy of his vote, and others should not get any hint of which party he or she had voted for. The voting question is asked with the use of dummy ballot paper and the dummy ballot box. Normally, the names and symbol of all the contesting candidates and parties are listed on the dummy ballot paper which is handed over to the voter when the voting question is asked. They are requested to mark their response on that dummy ballot paper and put it secretly in the dummy ballot box which is sealed to maintain the confidence of the voters being interviewed.

Classification and Structure of Questions A questionnaire designed for measuring the opinion and attitudes of the voters contains questions that can be broadly classified into



Questionnaire, an Important Tool for Collecting Information

89

opinion questions and factual questions. Thus questions on the performance ratings of Sheila Dixit’s government in Delhi and her popularity rankings are opinion questions as they are based on the satisfaction levels of the voters in Delhi. On the other hand, questions like who is the chief minister of Delhi and since how long she has been in power are factual questions. The responses of factual questions are correct or incorrect, whereas the responses of the opinion questions are the views of the voters that cannot be termed as right or wrong. Though there is qualitative difference between these two kinds of questions, both these categories of questions complement each other. Thus election survey collects background data of the electorates like age groups, gender, educational attainments, economic class that are factual information as well as data on electoral politics that are based on opinion and attitudes of the voters. The measurement variables for factual questions are in “Yes or No” or “Correct or Incorrect” format, whereas for the opinion or attitude questions different types of scaling categories are used to measure the varying degrees of responses. Herein below is an illustration of the answer categories popularly used for measuring the response of the voters on opinion questions: Inappropriate Formulation: Are you satisfied with the performance of Sheila Dixit’s government in Delhi? Yes/No Appropriate Formulation: To what extent are you satisfied with the performance of Sheila Dixit’s government in Delhi—to a great extent, to some extent, not much or not at all? Questions are further differentiated on the basis of its structure into close and open-ended questions and choosing a particular structure for a question depends upon its needs and suitability. As the word denotes, a close-ended question is one in which the choice of answers has been closed and restricted to only a few answer variables. The answer categories are already predecided and the respondent has to pick up one or more answers as per their choice. The respondent has to choose an answer from the menu of answer variables provided in the question and is not given the freedom to pick an answer from outside. In literal terms, the choice of the responses has been closed in advance and there is no

90

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

choice to add a new response. Close-ended questions are further differentiated into three categories: close-ended with ordered answer variables, close-ended with unordered answer choices, and partially close-ended. On the other hand, an open-ended question is one in which the respondent has the freedom to give an answer of his choice as the answer variables are not provided in the question. Thus the ends of the questions are open and the responses of respondents are recorded in verbatim in the blank space provided beneath the question. A detailed analysis of the structure of questions with its advantages and disadvantages is necessary, as it will allow choosing the right format for designing election survey questionnaires.

Open-ended Questions An open-ended question does not provide answer variables but allows the respondent the freedom to record answers of their choice. The advantages of using open-ended questions in an election survey questionnaire are as follows: (a) if a researcher intends to obtain information on what is likely to be the most important issue in an election, it may be useful to ask this question in the open-ended format since different voters may give different kinds of responses. Open-ended questions will enable the voters to give the response the way he/she would like to give and the respondent will record it the way the voter will mention. Also it is difficult to anticipate various kinds of responses for such a question. Thus for any issue, if the enquiry is conducted for the first time and a new question is being framed, an open-ended question is a good alternative as making an exhaustive list of answer variables is neither possible nor naive. An open-ended question on an unexplored theme is a better option as it allows pre-testing of the questions through field trials among the respondents and soliciting information from survey experts. Based on the feedback information, the open-ended question can be turned into a close-ended format; (b) the universe of study in an election survey is so varied with



Questionnaire, an Important Tool for Collecting Information

91

differences among the voters on the basis of culture, language, regions, etc., that an open-ended question becomes necessary for collecting information. For example, the opinion of the voters about democracy in India and the way they perceive the meaning of the term is so exhaustive that the whole gamut of information can be captured only by an open-ended question; (c) an open-ended question is useful on issues which are politically or socially sensitive and that often lead to strong polarization or cleavages among the various sections of voters in the society. This format allows the voters to freely express their opinion and provide detailed reasons why they support or oppose an issue. Thus affirmative action for other backward classes in India is a politically sensitive and emotive issue that is opposed by sections of society who do not get the benefits. An open-ended question would give the respondents an opportunity to make a statement and provide a deeper insight on such kind of issues than a close-ended one; (d) open-ended questions are suitable for collecting personal information of the respondents which they can accurately recall and state it precisely and (e) open-ended questions are suitable if a nationwide survey intends to collect some localized information for which preparing an exhaustive list of answer variables would be cumbersome and time-consuming. For example, an open-ended question would be the best format to collect information about the local issues in general elections in India on which the voters make up their mind on whom to vote. Open-ended questions though quite useful in collecting information in certain contexts also have some inherent drawbacks. The drawbacks are: First, open-ended questions can be time consuming and burdensome for the respondents as they have to think and then express their opinions. For factual questions, they can recall from the past and narrate their experiences easily but if the question is on any issue, then they have to recollect it and form an argument to express their opinion; second, the respondents sometimes feel reluctant to answer open-ended questions as it involves thinking and finding an easy way out by providing irrelevant answers. Thus for open-ended questions, most of the answers do not address the

92

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

issue directly and are vague in response; third, the coding, entry, and analysis of the open-ended questions take much more time and greater efforts as compared with close-ended questions which can be done quickly and instantly; and finally open-ended questions do not provide accurate measurements of voter’s opinion and attitudes as survey experience reveals. The information collected though open-ended questions have been found to be inconsistent and incomparable at times.

Close-ended Questions Close ended with ordered answer variables is the most common type of questions that are used in surveys aimed at measuring voting behavior in India. This structure of question has a complete range of likely answer variables that are ordered systematically or sequentially. The answer variables provide the respondent the complete variety of answers from which to select one of their choices. Close-ended questions with ordered answer choices tend to be quite specific, less demanding for the respondent, and much easier to code and analyze than open-ended questions (Salant and Dillman, 1994). Close-ended questions with unordered answer variables are questions where choice of answers are not arranged in a continuum but presented in an unordered fashion. This type of question structure is mostly used in surveys where the respondents are asked to rank or prioritize certain issues. Close-ended questions with unordered responses are commonly used in election surveys to find out the popularity ratings of political leaders or ranking the achievements of the incumbent government based on the voter’s opinion and feedback. This question structure is more difficult as compared with close-ended questions with ordered answer variables as the voters have to think over the given choices and then rate them accordingly. A mix of both open-ended and close-ended questions is the partially open-ended question. This question combines the advantages of both the question structures as it provides all the possible



Questionnaire, an Important Tool for Collecting Information

93

ranges of answer variables and also provides space for recording the respondent’s answer. This question structure is used for measuring the voter’s opinion on certain electoral issues like considerations for forming voting decisions. Survey findings show that the voters mostly tend to select the answer from the existing answer variables in the question and only in some cases it yields new information. But in most of the cases, this question structure does not bring forth any additional information. Partially close-ended questions have the advantage of not forcing respondents into predefined boxes that do not fit the situation and it occasionally generates new information (Salant and Dillman, 1994). Close-ended questions are the dominant form of question structure that is used in election surveys for measuring the voting behavior and attitudes of the electorate. Though close-ended questions cannot gather exact information even with the best graded answer categories in some situations, it still remains the popular choice of question structure for opinion polls and exit polls. The advantages of using close-ended questions are as follows: First it collects information that are more consistent, credible, and authentic as compared with open-ended questions; second it is easier for the respondents to pick up the answer category of their choice and for the enumerators to record it correctly. The respondent does not need to think in which form to answer the question but only choose from the available answer options; third close-ended questions are less time-consuming to ask and record the responses and also for data coding and processing; and finally close-ended questions with the same answer variables used over a period of time can provide comparability and time series data that could not be possible with open-ended questions.

Evaluating the Survey Questionnaire The questionnaire for measuring the voting behavior and attitudes of the electorate are evaluated at two stages. The first stage of evaluation takes place while designing and developing the questionnaire

94

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

and the second stage by conducting field trials for testing its efficacy and relevance. The process of questionnaire designing for survey research has evolved over a period of time through sustained research and practice. This led to the development of some quality standards and protocols that are accepted and followed by opinion polling industry. However, a questionnaire designed keeping in mind all the thumb rules outlined above is still not fool proof and needs to be minutely evaluated and reviewed before it can be finalized for use in an election survey. Thus the questionnaire needs to be evaluated for the following parameters: First whether the questions are relevant and consistent with the stated objectives of the survey; Second are the questions easily understood by the voters and are they willing to answer the questions; and Third whether the field enumerators are able to administer the questionnaire properly within the expected time frame and address the issues it originally intended to enquire. While the questionnaire may have few time-tested questions that might have been used in earlier surveys, the majority of questions are new and freshly written. So a new questionnaire designed is evaluated and reviewed at two stages before it is finalized for a survey.

Stage I Exploration and Development The initial stage of questionnaire designing for measuring voting behavior is exploratory as new questions are formulated, revised, and reformulated to give it a credible shape. At the early stage of designing the question, conducting a focus group discussion (FGD) with a few voters from the universe of the study is a useful exercise. FGD allows in finding out whether the respondents know or do not know about the issues of survey enquiry, the terms and words they popularly use in their day-to-day life and explore their overall understanding and perspective of the survey topics. The feedback given by the voters on the electoral issues provides a direction on which questions can be designed as the knowledge, experience, and perceptions shared by the voters immensely



Questionnaire, an Important Tool for Collecting Information

95

help in deciding the question structure and answer categories for questions. FGD though qualitative in nature provides information about the survey topics from the respondent’s viewpoint and brings better clarity in designing the questionnaire in the preliminary stages. A good method of evaluating a questionnaire is through the method of cognitive interviewing. Cognitive interviewing is a specialized method of evaluating a questionnaire by understanding the hidden thought process and observable process of the respondents. The purpose is to identify poor questions in the questionnaire that create misinterpretation and confusion among the respondents and correct the response errors. Two types of cognitive interviewing methods that are popularly used are think-aloud interviewing and verbal probing techniques. It is useful for election survey research as the voters give not only an overall feedback about the questionnaire but also specific suggestions on the content and wording of the questions. Thus FGD and cognitive interviewing helps in preparing a draft questionnaire for the survey. The next stage in the development of questionnaires is review of the instrument by survey experts. Expert opinion on the design of the questionnaire in terms of both technical and quality of content is an essential step. The questionnaire is evaluated by experts on finer points like the length of the questionnaire, the wording and ordering of the questions, the clarity and preciseness of the questions, the suitability of the structure of questions, the choice of answer variables for the questions, instructions for the field investigators, skip patterns used, and mismatch between questions and answer categories. The checklist detailed here is indicative as some experts use a longer list with more exhaustive checkpoints for evaluating and reviewing the questionnaire.

Stage II Pre-testing The questionnaire developed after exploration and evaluation undergoes pre-testing through field trials. The objectives of

96

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

testing the questionnaire are to find out the efficacy and validity of questions and the overall flow and consistency of the questionnaire. A pilot survey among a small sample of voters is done with fieldwork procedures similar to full-scale survey to pre-test the questionnaire. The pre-test of questions is done to check the following: First to find out variations in the question and whether any specific question can be asked in a different way; second to find out if the question conveys the same meaning to different respondents and is understood in a similar manner. Every question is intended to convey a particular meaning and it becomes imperative to find out if the respondents are able to understand the import of the question in the same way or differently; third even if the question is easy for the respondent to comprehend, it may not be easy for the respondent to answer that question. The task of answering the question may be difficult for the respondent and the pre-test aims at assessing the “task difficulty” in the question; and f inally whether the question raises the curiosity and interest levels of the respondents during the interview. Apart from the questions that are rigorously tested during the pilot survey, the questionnaire is also pre-tested on the following parameters: First while administering the questionnaire the flow of the interview is smooth and consistent; second the ordering of the questions is done topic wise and clubbed together properly. The placement of easy and light questions as well as serious and difficult ones done correctly; third the clarity of instructions for skip patterns and double level probes and comfort levels of the enumerators while administering the questionnaire; fourth the time frame for completing the interview is reasonable and the questionnaire is neither very lengthy nor too short; fifth any section of the questionnaire that is vulnerable to the field investigator’s bias which tends to creep in the questionnaire despite all the care and cautions taken; and finally the interactive levels of the questionnaire and how well it connects with the respondents and motivates them to participate in the survey.



Questionnaire, an Important Tool for Collecting Information

97

The pre-testing of questionnaires is done through two methods: 1. Participating Pre-test: In this method of pre-testing, the respondent is informed that the interview is only for testing the questionnaire and it is not a real survey. The advantage of participating in a pre-test is that it allows the enumerators to further probe after reading out the main question from the questionnaire. Thus the questions can be asked in several ways to find out how it is understood and interpreted by the respondents. Thus questions that might convey a different meaning to the respondents can be identified and corrected. However, this method of pre-testing has some major disadvantages. All the questions in the questionnaire cannot be asked with further probes as it will be time consuming and the respondent may not spare so much time. Further the respondent knows that it is not a real survey and may not give proper responses. 2. Undeclared Pre-test: The respondent is not informed in this method of pre-testing that the purpose of the survey is experimental for evaluation of the questionnaire. The interview of the respondents is conducted formally and completed as if it is a real survey. The advantage of this method is that the completed interviews can be electronically punched and data analyzed to find out the problems in the questionnaire. The data will reveal any discrepancies in the questions as their answer responses would be inconsistent and skewed. The biggest disadvantage of an undeclared pre-test is that the enumerators can just ask questions only from the questionnaire and cannot probe deeper like in a participatory pre-test.

6 Fieldwork and Data Collection

Data collection and fieldwork are also important aspects of survey research or research aimed at measuring voting behavior. A representative sample or a good survey questionnaire cannot guarantee a good voting behavior study unless and until it is supported by methodical data collection. Survey research involves several processes like sampling, questionnaire designing, data collection, data analysis, and reporting of the findings. But amongst different activities of measuring voting behavior, data collection is one of the most important activities. How accurately one can measure voting behavior depends upon how systematically and how carefully the data were collected. Since the two activities related to measuring voting behavior, sampling, and questionnaires involve a smaller number of people and are largely conducted in office situations, it is easier to monitor and have control on these research activities. But since the data collection through the interview of voters is conducted at different locations generally engaging a large number of field investigators, it is extremely difficult to exercise control on the data collection activity and ensure that the data are collected by adopting the best data collection practices. The interviews with the voters aimed at measuring voting behavior should be conducted in a face-to-face situation using a structured interview schedule to minimize other kinds of biases. For face-to-face interviews, the field investigators contact the sampled voters at their homes or places of work and interview them with a standard questionnaire.



Fieldwork and Data Collection

99

The common perception among people is that data collection in an election survey is casual talk between people who are sent out to collect data and the voters. This perception may be partially true for some election surveys, but any serious attempt for measuring voting behavior demands interviews to be conducted by trained field investigators and following acceptable field practices. The importance of a good sample and a good questionnaire is realized by most of the opinion polling agencies or those who try to study voting behavior, but the importance of training investigators about how to conduct interviews or how to collect information from the voters is not considered important by many. Among the various stages of election survey that require careful attention and investment, the training of enumerators for data collection is very low on the priority list of most of the survey agencies. Most of the polling agencies resort to short briefing sessions on the method of data collection with the focus on using the questionnaire and numerical coding of the responses. They provide detailed written guidelines for conducting the fieldwork but fail to emphasize and indoctrinate the enumerators with the importance of adhering to the checklist of practices by holding practical or simulated sessions. They rarely hold full-length training workshops for field investigators to train them in interviewing techniques, in using the survey instruments with practical demonstrations and methods of conducting interviews. Some agencies even resort to cost cutting by following the practice of distributing the questionnaire among the voters to fill them and collect it back after it is completed. One of the reasons for the poor quality of surveys for measuring voting behavior and attitudes of electorates in India can be attributed to the lack of proper training in data collection and fieldwork practices. Thus why the training of field investigators for data collection is so crucial for an election survey needs to be probed in detail and the components of training that are mandatory from the overall perspective need to be identified. This chapter is divided into two sections, namely, on training in fieldwork practices and data collection that would be over lapping at some places. The first section

100

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

emphasizes on data collection as a scientific and systematic fieldwork exercise that requires trained field investigators for gathering election-related information. It will probe the reasons for providing extensive training and capacity building of the field investigators and the need for evaluation of training imparted to the field investigators. This section also deals with the structure of training sessions and modules like the orientation program of enumerators, the method of interviewing technique, and the use of various survey instruments. The second section deals with the rules and practices that should be followed by enumerators while conducting fieldwork interviews in India for data collection. The basics of data collection explained in this section are based on a compilation of best practices and protocols that are followed by polling organizations conducting election surveys. The third chapter brings out the intricacies in conducting fieldwork in India arising out of geographical variations, innumerable languages, and sociocultural disparities in the country. It also attempts to provide a short glimpse of interstate variations and resources required in conducting fieldwork in India and challenges associated with it.

Need for Training in Election Survey Training of field investigators in interviewing techniques and the method of using various survey instruments during fieldwork is a crucial aspect of election survey. The need for training in interviewing technique and data collection is necessary since those who are recruited for doing fieldwork do not have the requisite knowledge and experience for conducting surveys. Some field investigators may have the experience of conducting interviews, but it is elementary and theoretical and not at all practical and professional in nature. Similarly some have experience of conducting market research survey that is simple, short, and less technical than election polls. On the other hand, election surveys conducted for measuring voting behavior in India generally use detailed questionnaires and other survey instruments. The interviews for



Fieldwork and Data Collection

101

conducting election surveys require the use of a sampling method for selecting voters, administering questions with skips and double level of probes, use of dummy ballot box and papers, or asking the most important question about voting preferences and show cards for ratings, etc. Thus, training of field investigators about how to conduct interviews becomes imperative. The need for training field investigators for election survey arises from the structural inhibitions and limitations of teaching research methodology in the Indian university system resulting in a lack of exposure of students to the survey method. The lack of knowledge about survey research and fieldwork arises from the fact that the teaching of research methodology in social science in India is of a very basic nature and is confined only at the theoretical level. Except for the subject of economics, survey research continues to be confined to classroom teaching for most social science subjects. Thus students learn the various methodologies of social science research and its components like sampling, method of data collection, and data analysis but they hardly get a chance to do actual fieldwork research to gain practical experience. As a result, most of the students who are generally recruited for conducting election surveys do not have the required knowledge and training for conducting survey. The main objective of election surveys conducted by academic institutions like CSDS is to empirically compute the voting behavior and attitudes of Indian voters and to map the specificities of Indian democratic experience. The training of field investigators for conducting election surveys is aimed at fulfilling twin objectives: training field investigators (FIs) how to conduct face-to-face interviews for data collection and training them on various aspects of social science research based on survey method. The intrinsic relationship between the structured questionnaires designed primarily to collect voters’ opinions and attitudes in order to assess their participation in the election and the field investigators who generate empirical data through fieldwork are addressed by training workshops. Since the objective of data collection for measuring the electorate’s opinion and attitude is entirely different from

102

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

conventional survey research, the training of FIs is not only on interview techniques, but also focused on other equally important aspects of research process. In fact it recognizes trainees as the practitioners of survey research, who actually study “democracy and elections.” For this reason, FIs become a part of the process by which a particular methodology to study Indian electoral behavior is evolved and employed according to the contextual specificities of Indian political culture. Research organizations like CSDS conduct detailed training workshops for training field investigators which spans two or three days. Jyoti, a field investigator who conducted the fieldwork in the Patiala parliamentary constituency in the Punjab during the Lok Sabha 2009 elections, shares her experience with us: The National Election Study (NES) 2009 workshop taught and trained us completely before we went to the field for conducting face to face interviews. We were taught the techniques to begin the interviews, ways to continue the interview and hold the respondents’ curiosity and interest, to code the answers given by the respondents … everything that we needed to know. We were asked to conduct mock interviews which were later discussed in the workshop to iron out any errors we did in field situations.

Ashish Ranjan, who did the checking of the data collected during NES 2009 at the Chandni Chowk Lok Sabha constituency of Delhi, told us that the tone and tenor of asking questions from the respondents was very crucial. It could either make the respondent comfortable and eager to answer all questions correctly or it could put him off and answer in a wayward manner to complete the interview. The training workshop he attended helped him in not only understanding the ways of putting the respondents at ease during the interview but also cooperating with him when he went to them for cross-checking the data. An election survey for general elections at a national level involves deployment of field investigators on a large scale spread across all the states of India. The training of teams at the state level and introducing and initiating students to survey-based



Fieldwork and Data Collection

103

research becomes essential from the point of view of standardization. The various components of training that are addressed during the training workshops are the following:

Essential Components of Fieldwork Training Motivation and Orientation of Field Enumerators The accurate measurement of voting behavior depends upon various factors, but one important factor which determines the reliability of measurement of voting behavior is how carefully and systematically the fieldwork was conducted or how well the interviews were conducted. It is relatively easier to draw the representative sample and design a good quality interview schedule, but it is comparatively much more difficult to ensure that the fieldwork is conducted with utmost care. In any election survey, the work of conducting interviews/data collection is done by a large number of field investigators and it is an extremely challenging task to ensure that all the interviews are conducted with the utmost care, in a more or less standardized manner. Since it is not possible to keep an eye on every interview being conducted or on every field investigator, the technique, which helps in ensuring that most of these interviews are conducted properly, is a standardized training of the field investigators who are engaged in the work of data collection/ conducting interviews with the voters. Besides other technical issues, one of the issues, which needs to be emphasized during the training is the motivational aspect. The field investigators need to be motivated for the fieldwork, by highlighting the importance of such studies. The field investigators should be oriented in such a way that they should feel proud of being part of such research and should not treat this as merely one assignment for which he would get paid. They should be motivated to feel that they are part and parcel of the survey and the most vital link in achieving the overall objective and aims of the election survey. Apart from payment during the training, the investigators should be motivated

104

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

to participate in this survey since they would get experience and exposure, which they are unlikely to get in any other survey. Once investigators are sufficiently motivated, half of the work is done; it leaves very little anxiety about investigators not conducting the interviews properly. Half the anxiety or uncertainty about whether interviews were conducted properly can be taken care of by field supervisors whose main work is to supervise and monitor the work of the field investigators. Motivating the FIs is definitely an important aspect of these training workshops, as they need to be motivated enough to endure the varied forms of hardships and practical hurdles they may face during field investigation. For example, one such field investigator who refuses to be named shares his experience in Uttarakhand during the assembly elections held in the state in 2012. He points out that the state was under heavy snowfall during the time, but he still braved all the odds and hardships to conduct the interviews. Another field investigator, who conducted the fieldwork in one of the assembly constituencies in Uttar Pradesh in 2012, narrates how he was arrested while he was conducting fieldwork. Although there is nothing illegal about conducting an election survey, the police apprehended him mistakenly, and he was later released when the coordinator of the state intervened. Vibha, who was a field investigator during the 2009 Lok Sabha elections, says: it is very important for field investigators like us to understand that the survey is important and worthwhile. There is a lot of everyday challenge which the field investigator might have to endure during the survey and so motivation is of prime importance to make him/ her trained to face such difficulties.

Interviewing and Communication Technique The interviewing technique that is popularly used for measuring voting behavior and attitudes of voters is face-to-face interviews based on a structured interview schedule, though in order to cut



Fieldwork and Data Collection

105

cost and time as there are agencies, which use the questionnaire for conducting the interviews. Very often these questionnaires are not used for face-to-face interviews but are distributed amongst voters for them to answer. Though such data collection technique/ interviewing technique is used by many researchers/agencies, the standard practice of conducting interviews in studies aimed at measuring voting behavior is the interview in the face-to-face situation. There are various ways of conducting interviews, one being different from other. The method of conducting interviews depends upon what the interview aims to achieve. The method of conducting interview by the journalist with the political leader is different from how interviews should be conducted amongst voters for measuring voting behavior. While conducting interviews with the political leader, the intention is to ask difficult and uncomfortable questions to understand his/her political mindset, but the interviews amongst the voters are in simple words, straight, intended only to gather information on which he/she has an opinion. The effort is not even to educate the voter about issues on which he/ she may not have any opinion. The interviews in elections surveys intended to measure voting behavior are plain and simple, aimed only at gathering information. This forms an essential part of the training workshop when the field investigators are being trained. Vibha shares her experiences of field investigation in Punjab during NES 2009 and points out how during her survey at a village one of the elderly male voters was extremely uncomfortable when she approached him for the interview. She says: When I initially knocked at the door of the little hut, he told me that he is very busy and asked me to go away. I thought maybe he is uncomfortable with my presence so I asked him for a glass of water. He was amazed by my request and gaped at me for a while, and asked whether I am comfortable in drinking water from his house as from my appearance it appears that I belong to a higher caste. When I told him that I do not believe in such kind of caste discriminations and would be happy to come inside his house and talk to him in general even if he does not want to answer my

106

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

questions in the survey, he readily agreed. He gladly answered all the questions from the questionnaire.

Similarly, conducting fieldwork in metropolitan cities poses a lot of problems which is different from rural and moffusil areas. Banasmita who was a part of the CSDS 2009 national elections studies team and conducted the fieldwork in Delhi’s Greater Kailash area points out how most of the houses had security guards and did not welcome strangers to conduct surveys. I had to convince most of them that I did not have any political affiliation and work for a neutral social science research organization. This would not be enough for them, but the moment they heard that the survey finding will be released in media, they became excited to answer my questions.

The field investigators are taught that while administering the questionnaire to the respondent, care has to be taken that the interviewee is not under any external influence or pressure. Jyoti narrates her experience when she conducted fieldwork in Patiala, Punjab, during the 2009 Lok Sabha elections. She recalls that quite a few of the sampled women voters were under extreme influence from male members in the family whenever any political question was asked to them. Her experience at the training workshop was a great help in tackling such a challenge. She narrates: Although the male members of the house were initially hesitant in allowing the woman to be interviewed alone, I explained to them that for the benefit of the survey, it is of utmost importance that the respondent answers all the questions with no external influence. It was after much explanation and convincing that they finally gave in to my requests.

At times it is difficult for the male field investigators to ask background questions like information on caste, class, etc., to female respondents, and it is here that politeness and patience in explaining the objective of such surveys goes a long way in developing a sense of confidence in answering the questions.



Fieldwork and Data Collection

107

Administering the Questionnaire and Using Handbook The major focus during the training workshop is on administering the questionnaire to the voters during an election survey. The questionnaire is explained and discussed with the field investigators in an interactive and simulated way by the trainers. Mock interviews are conducted amongst the field investigators. The mock interviews provide the field investigators an actual feel of the interviews to be conducted during field investigation and understand the questions and answer provided in the questionnaire. The discussion ensures that the enumerators understand the importance or intention of the questions, so that they have full clarity of the questionnaire to be used during the survey. All the queries and confusions that arise in the minds of the field investigators are addressed and sorted out during the training. For most of the questions, the answer options are not to be read out during the interview and the response of the voters are to be marked in the relevant answer category provided in the questionnaire. Instructions are given in the questionnaire for questions where the answer variables are to be read out to the respondents but it should be properly explained to the enumerators during the workshop. The questionnaire contains some questions with skips patterns and double level probes. Double level probes are questions where the respondents are first asked about their opinion on certain issues and after getting a response they are further asked the levels to which they agree or disagree with it. These type of special questions need to be properly explained and demonstrated to the enumerators during their training. For every survey, there is an enumerator’s handbook that contains the guidelines that are to be followed during conducting the interviews and coding the questionnaires. The handbook is a user’s manual and also contains pre-code answers for open-ended questions and questions which have a long list of answer variables. The handbook should be discussed and deliberated in detail with the trainees during the training workshop, so that it is used uniformly and in the same manner by all the enumerators.

108

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

Pavan, a field investigator during NES 2009 points out, “The field investigators manual given to us was quite exhaustive and elaborate and it was very helpful to us when we went to the field for the survey. Every possible pre codes for questions which required it was present in the manual.”

Use of Dummy Ballot Paper and Show Cards Question on voting is the heart of any election survey and the utmost care should be taken in asking that question. If the survey fails in getting a response to this question, then in a way the entire exercise of election survey fails. Elections surveys till early days did not take proper care while asking the voting question and while interviewing, there was hardly any effort to maintain the secrecy of vote and the voting question was asked like any other question. That resulted in a bigger error in vote estimate may be because some voters may be hesitant in telling the truth and may have given a wrong answer suited for the situation or the surrounding where the interview may be taking place. Realizing this mistake, various innovations have been done for asking the voting question. It is desirable that in a proper study on voting behavior, the voting question should be asked in such a way that voters should feel confident in responding to that question, without any hesitation. The question on voting should be asked in such a way that while answering, it should allow voters to maintain his/her secrecy of vote at least at the place where the interview is being conducted. While some agencies still ask the voting question like any other questions without realizing the sensitivity of this question, a proper election survey aimed at measuring voting behavior has begun asking the voting question in a secret manner. During the last decade or little more than that, a unique feature, which has been added to the election survey, is of asking the voting question using dummy ballot paper and dummy ballot box. Normally, the voter with whom the interview is being conducted is handed over a dummy ballot paper which has names and symbols



Fieldwork and Data Collection

109

of all the candidates contesting election in that constituency and they are asked to mark the candidate or the party for whom they had voted or for whom they intend to vote. The voters mark his/ her preference and put the paper in the dummy ballot box which investigator carries, without showing it to any one, not even the investigator. The purpose is to find out from the voters which party or candidate they voted for or would vote for in the elections. There are generally two questions that probe the voting intentions of the electorates. One question is on the current election where the voter is asked whom they would vote for or voted for depending upon the timings of the survey. The second question is on their voting preference in the previous election referred to as “recall question.” During the workshop, the field investigators need to be explained how to ask the voting question, it being a sensitive question and being the heart of the study. There is a need to focus on how to use the ballot paper and the ballot box for asking the voting question. If there are questions, which require some visual to be shown, effort should be made to use same visual to be used by all the field investigators to maintain uniformity, to maintain standardization. At times some show card or scales are used for ranking the performance of political leaders, like a scale of 1 to 10 where 1 is very good and 10 is very bad. For such questions, the voters are shown the show cards during the interview as visual aids for helping them in making an assessment. The method of using the show card needs to be demonstrated and explained to the field investigators, so that they can use them during the interview. Similarly other visual aids like photographs of political leaders and major political events are also sometimes shown to the voters for finding out their awareness and in contextualizing the questions.

Mock Interviews and Field Trials by Enumerators Mock interviews and field trials form an important component of the training module and are conducted by field investigators after

110

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

their training is complete. As the term denotes, mock interviews are interviews randomly conducted by field investigators for practice and trials after receiving their training and before the actual process of data collection before the survey begins. Mock interviews are a useful exercise to evaluate the impact of training on the enumerators and their preparedness levels for conducting the real survey. The enumerators are required to interview people based on the questionnaire and numerically code them. The questionnaires of the pre-field trials are then physically checked by the team of trainers to find out whether the enumerators have properly followed all the instructions for conducting the interviews, the skip intervals, marking of answer variables, coding of questions, etc. It helps in making an assessment of the field investigators in terms of understanding and administering the questionnaire to the voters and the overall handling of the interviews in field situation. Both Ashish and Jyoti who were a part of the NES 2009 conducted by CSDS narrate how they were asked to conduct mock interviews after which their experiences and the questionnaires were discussed in detail during the training workshop. Such an exercise helped them to discuss the actual problems that they might face during the field investigations and clarify their doubts beforehand.

Best Practices for Data Collection and Field Interviews There are different interview techniques that are employed in a survey for interviewing the respondent that range from face-toface, self-administered through mail, telephonic, and computer assisted through Internet. These interviewing techniques are used for different kinds of survey research conducted in India but for measuring the voting behavior and attitudes the most preferred form is interviews of the voters in face-to-face situations by the enumerators. The reason for using face-to-face interview techniques is due to the fact that a sizable section of the electorate in India is illiterate (not able to read and write) so the question of



Fieldwork and Data Collection

111

self-administering a written questionnaire does not arise. Similarly telephonic election survey which is so popular in the first world for conducting election surveys is also not a practically feasible option in India as more than 6 out of 10 voter households do not have the telephone connectivity. Thus a cross-sectional survey for computing the opinion of the cross-section of voters cannot be done by mailing them a questionnaire for self-administration or telephonically. Thus interviews by directly contacting the sampled voters, and asking them questions in the face-to-face interview situation by trained investigators remains the best and the most practical method for conducting an election survey in India. The basic rules and best practices that are followed by polling agencies in India while conducting face-to-face personal interviews are as follows:

Familiarizing with the Questionnaire and Location The face-to-face interviewing technique is conversational in nature as it involves the work of field investigators asking questions to the sampled voters directly and recording their responses. All the questions are read out verbatim from the questionnaire by the field investigators. During the interview the enumerator should simultaneously have an eye-to-eye contact with the respondent as well as reading out the questions from the questionnaire. This requires a little practice and would be possible only if the field investigators familiarize themselves with the questionnaire thoroughly before going out for the fieldwork. Familiarity of the enumerators with the questionnaire is important as it allows them to ask the questions fluently and clearly creating a positive impression on the respondents. On the other hand, if the enumerator conducts the interview without familiarization with the questionnaire, the chances of making mistakes become quite high while reading out the questions. The enumerators would be forced to interrupt the voters for making corrections leading to abrupt interviews creating an adverse impact on the respondents. A free flowing and

112

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

smooth interview excites and interests the respondents and the information gathered is more authentic and true. Similarly the enumerators must visit the sampled locations for data collection and familiarize themselves with the place and people living in the area. Familiarization with the location and people creates a rapport of the enumerators with the people living in the area. Since the sampled location for the election survey could be a village, town, or a city, the familiarization with the location is advantageous for the enumerators as people help them in finding the sampled voters and save time and energy for data collection.

Establishing the Purpose and Credibility of the Survey The next step which needs to be followed by the field investigators before the actual interview begins is building a rapport and establishing his credibility amongst the voters in the locality where he had gone for conducting the interview. When enumerators go to any location for conducting the survey and try to find out the residence of the voter, people ask questions about the purpose of the election survey and meeting the voters and queries connected with it. For this the field investigators need to clearly explain to the sampled voters the objective of the election survey, detailed information of the organization that is conducting the survey, and the purpose for which the interview is being conducted. Apart from this enumerators should introduce themselves to the people they meet in the locality and reveal their identity. If needed, they should show their identity cards or authorization letter to ensure that they establish their credibility among the people in the area. The information provided to the people in the area should be true and correct because if any suspicion arises in the mind of people, it would become difficult for the investigator to conduct the interviews in the sampled locations. If the sampled voters become suspicious about the intention of the investigators, they may not speak out their mind and provide true answers. Thus before starting the interview, it is necessary



Fieldwork and Data Collection

113

that the field investigators should establish their credentials, the credential of the agency, which is conducting the survey, and the credential of the survey (see Box 6.1). Box 6.1 Enumerator’s Introduction and Purpose of Survey My name is ________________________ and I have come from _______________________ (Name of polling agency or research organization) based in Delhi. We are conducting a national level survey to find out the opinion of people on politics and elections and for this purpose we are interviewing thousands of voters in all the states across the country. The findings of this survey will be used for television programmes and writing articles in newspapers and magazines. This survey is an independent study and is not linked to any political party or government agency. Whatever information you provide will be kept strictly confidential. Source: Authors.

Convincing the Respondent and Informed Consent Some election surveys use purposive sampling that allows the enumerators the freedom to select the respondents on their own based on quotas. In such cases the field investigators have the option of not interviewing those voters who refuse or are not willing to be interviewed. But organizations that use random sampling for election surveys the sample of voters are drawn beforehand from the voter list. The investigators are not given a choice of selecting the voters but have to interview only those voters who are selected in the sample. The job of the enumerators become more difficult as in such situation the respondent needs an explanation why they were selected for the survey. The enumerators have to convince the

114

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

voters that they have been selected by a process of sampling and gain their confidence. The best way of explaining and convincing the voters in India about the selection process is by telling them that they were selected by the technique of random selection of voters, or else, in a layman’s word, by simple lottery. If the voter agrees to give an interview only then the interview is conducted. After the voter is convinced and is ready for the survey, an informed consent is taken from them before starting the interviews. An illustrative format for taking the informed consent is given below (see Box 6.2).

Box 6.2 Statement of Informed Consent Participation in this survey is voluntary and it is entirely up to you to answer or not answer any question that I ask. We hope that you will take part in this survey since your participation is important. It usually takes 30 to 40 minutes to complete this interview. Please spare some time for the interview and help me in successfully completing the survey. May I begin the interview now? 1. Respondent agrees to be interviewed

2. Respondent does not agree to be interviewed

Source: Authors.

On the Spot Interviews and Time for Completion In a face-to-face interview situation the questions given in the questionnaire should be asked one by one and the questionnaire should never be handed over to the respondent or any other person at the sampled location. The voters in an election survey are interviewed in a formal setting but the tone of interview is conversational and persuasive in nature. In the pre-poll and post-poll surveys, the interviews with the voters are conducted generally at their residence,



Fieldwork and Data Collection

115

spontaneously and they do not have to prepare beforehand for the question answer session. The reason for not handing over the questionnaire to the voters before the interview arises from the fact that the respondents would then prepare themselves by pre-formulating the answers for different questions. This would take away the spontaneity of the respondents and they would try to provide answers that would be politically or socially correct and acceptable. That is the reason that even if the respondent expresses the desire to go through the questionnaire before agreeing to answer the questions, it is desirable that the field investigators should gently tell them that they are not permitted to do so. The enumerators are instructed to conduct the interview of the voters and fill the questionnaires and not to hand over the questionnaire to the electorate under any circumstances. The time required for completing the interview with the respondents depends upon the size of the questionnaire. The enumerators should clearly mention to the sample voter the approximate time required for completing the interview. In case of short questionnaires generally there is no problem but field investigators face problem if the questionnaire is a lengthy one and takes more time. In such cases, the investigator should tell the sampled voters a rough time span that would be required for completing the interview. The enumerators should avoid giving false assurances to the voters that the interview would be over quickly or within a short period as they would get impatient if the interview continues beyond the mentioned time frame. This could result in a few incomplete interviews or the responses given by the respondents that may not be satisfactory. Incomplete interviews not only lead to high non-response errors in the survey but also shortfall in the sample achieval rates and loss of data.

Questions To Be Read Out in Same Wording and Sequence The survey aimed at analyzing voting behavior and attitudes of the electorate entails interviewing thousand of voters to gather consistent and reliable information. The interviews are conducted with the

116

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

help of a structured questionnaire to maintain standardization in data collection. All the questions provided in the questionnaire are asked to the sampled voters in more or less a similar manner by the enumerators, so that it communicates the same meaning. The enumerators read out all the questions verbatim and are not allowed to change the sequence and wording of the questions. The sequence of questions in the questionnaire is decided on the basis of the seriousness of questions, transitions, and other parameters and it is strictly adhered to during the field investigation. The interview of the voter begins with the first question and progresses sequentially to end with the final question as given in the questionnaire. In every election survey, there are questions that appear similar to each other but are in fact different from each other. Such questions have to be carefully read out so that the subtle difference between them is clearly understood by the voters. Similarly there are some questions in the questionnaire on certain issues that appear to contradict each other. Such questions are deliberately given in the questionnaire to gauge the stability and strength of the voter’s opinion. Soham, a field investigator during NES 2009 conducted by CSDS said that sometimes an exception was made when it was seen that the interviewee is giving a wrong answer to a question, because he is unable to understand the exact meaning of the question. The question is kept aside and again asked at the end of the interview, to see whether the interviewee gives the correct answer if he thinks it to be a different question. However, it is very important that the wording and the sequence of the sentences is followed as it is, because in an effort to explain the question, its meaning may be altered by the field investigator leading to faulty data collection.

Interview Should Be Gently Probing and Objective The interviewing technique used in an election survey is different than the interviewing techniques used by media or for other



Fieldwork and Data Collection

117

kinds of research. The purpose of interviewing is to probe the voters for their opinion and views on the questions connected with elections and their electoral behavior. The question answer session with the voters is not an interview in the literal sense of the term. Interviews are not conducted in the style of investigation but in a gently probing tone to solicit answers from the voters. Since the respondents are not bound to give interviews, the tone and style of the enumerators should indicate that the voters are doing a favor by answering the questions. The enumerators adopt an objective approach to the interviews and are not allowed to give clues or suggestions to the voters for any questions. The field investigators are trained not to make any facial expressions or gestures that would indicate adverse or positive reaction to the responses given by the voters. The enumerators should not give their own opinions or get into argument with the voters on issues that may be controversial or politically sensitive during the interview. This is necessary as it would influence the voter’s mind as the respondent would then become biased and try to give answers that would be consistent with the enumerator’s viewpoint. Similarly the enumerators are instructed not to express their views on any issue that could be contrary to the views of the majority of the people in the locality. This could vitiate the environment and create tensions and may lead to a situation where the enumerators could be asked to leave the locality without conducting the interviews. Thus the thumb rule is that if there are people who express their opinion on sensitive issues, it is best for the enumerators to patiently hear them without offering any suggestions or comments.

Other Practices and Rules During election surveys, there are voting questions and other sensitive questions that the voter may not like to answer in the presence of other people. If other people are present where the interview of the voter is being conducted, then the respondent

118

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

may not give true answers. Thus it is desirable that the interview of sampled voters should be conducted in an area or spot where there is very little scope of interference from others. Field investigators should try and discourage a crowd/small group to collect around the respondent during the interview and ensure that the voter alone has the opportunity to answer. There are several occasions when the field investigator makes false promises or commitments to the voters for sparing their time. The enumerators are instructed not to breach the faith of people by making false promises as it is against survey ethics and would pose problems for conducting data collection in the future. The sampled voters in an election survey in India is quite varied and can range from highly educated people to total illiterates. The interviews of literate voters are easy as they understand the questions and answer them with clarity. But voters living in villages and slums are mostly semi-illiterates or illiterates who do not understand or comprehend some questions. In such cases, the question should be repeated and the enumerators should read the questions slowly and more audibly than it was done before. In case the respondent fails to understand a particular question even after being repeated by the enumerator, then that question should be skipped and the next question should be probed. Similarly the voter may also provide answers that the field investigator may not understand. The enumerator should request the respondent to repeat the answers in clearer terms and if it is still vague, then the voter should be gently encouraged to be more specific and clear. The voter should be given adequate time to understand and grasp the question and then provide the answers but they should not be prompted or given clues to answer the questions.

Difficulties in Conducting Fieldwork in India India, being the largest parliamentary democracy in the world, conducting elections as well as election surveys is a challenging and daunting task due to its sheer geographical expanse and



Fieldwork and Data Collection

119

overwhelming population. It has a large number of spoken languages and dialects, cultural diversities, extremes of climatic conditions, and socioeconomic variations, which results in conducting a survey not only exciting but at the same time difficult and challenging. There are also a lot of interstate variations which one has to confront while conducting survey in India due to political problems like separatist movements that are happening in the country. The parliamentary/assembly constituencies allocated to the field investigators during a survey is randomly sampled, so there is every possibility that he/she might be able to travel to locales of immense scenic beauty or barren and rugged terrain with sparse human inhabitation. The fact that India is very beautiful and a travelers’ paradise, it is of course a matter of great joy if one can travel to the backwaters of Kerala, the beautiful beaches of Goa, or the snow capped mountains of Himalayas at Leh-Ladakh to conduct field investigation. However, at the same time, it should be kept in mind that sometimes the diverse geographical and climatic variations in locale can be challenging and involve immense hardship. For example, some hill states are thinly populated and at the same time secluded from the rest of the habitation. This means that it is not only difficult to travel to such places due to communication bottlenecks but it also involves a lot of time, effort, and cost to conduct the field investigation. This scenario is especially true with respect to the North Eastern region and the hilly states of India. Distance and the lack of proper communication proves to be quite a challenge especially in areas like Kumaon, Garhwal, Himachal Pradesh, or Sikkim. Due to the absence of well-developed roads, it is not possible to hire any vehicle, so it takes a lot of time to fill the questionnaire, more so since the entire distance in reaching the sampled location is covered by foot. Raunak best explains this difficulty: After random selection, I was allotted to do field investigation in Uttarakhand, while my friend Pavan was selected for Uttar Pradesh during assembly elections held in 2012. I took seven days more in filling up the same number of questionnaire which Pavan did as

120

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

there was no means of transport and I had to walk long distances in the hills to reach the sampled locations.

At the same time, it should be kept in mind that it is not always difficult only in the hilly terrains to cover distance. There are locations even in plain lands where transportation facilities are not well developed. For example, Pankaj narrates that he conducted fieldwork in the Bastar region of Chhattisgarh in 2009 and since there were no vehicles to travel in that region, he had to walk. Sometimes, a few prefer to hire a cycle or a bike. Pulkit conducted fieldwork in Goa during the 2012 assembly polls and travelled around the constituency in a hired bike. Uday did the same in the 2009 Lok Sabha elections where he travelled in a rented cycle through the Chhattisgarh forests. Pulkit reasons: I will any day prefer travelling by my rented vehicle over public transport system as I can plan my travel according to my needs, without depending entirely on the public transport system. Also, since bikes are readily available in Goa, and I knew where to hire from, since I am a resident of the state, it helped me. At the same time, I enjoyed my field work as I could travel at my own pace, take breaks in the middle and visit anywhere nearby which I saw for the first time and also devote more time in the field work. Public transport system is time consuming and definitely more tiring.

At the same time, it should be kept in mind that the entire travel plan has to be decided by the field investigator, and it depends entirely on his interests and preferences and what he considers beneficial for the survey, and if he feels more comfortable walking, or in public transport than hiring vehicle, he should definitely go ahead and do so. Moreover, it is also pertinent to note that hilly terrains can also be challenging in terms of extreme climatic conditions. The Leh Ladakh region of Jammu and Kashmir record very low temperatures and most of the time, the mountain roads are blocked due to heavy snowfall. The same is true of Kedarnath–Badrinath regions of Uttarakhand. Moreover, landslides may result in completely



Fieldwork and Data Collection

121

cutting off such hilly regions from the rest of the plain land for days which might prove to be an impediment. Frost bite and severe cold are also a matter of everyday concern in such regions of hill states. Heat can also be a cause of concern for the field investigators, especially if the survey is conducted in the summers. Some regions in Rajasthan like Jaisalmer which record high temperatures which are as high as 45 degree centigrade in the months of May–June due to the Thar dessert makes travel during this period very difficult. Similarly, states like Bihar, Assam, and Meghalya are considered the most flood-prone states in India, where heavy monsoon rains and floods completely ravage the state practically every year. Anurima, who conducted field investigation in Meghalaya during the 2009 Lok Sabha polls, which records high rainfall, during the rainy session mentions: When I did my field investigation in the state in the Cherrapunji region, there were heavy thundershowers for a few days. The entire place was submerged under water. To my surprise boats were playing on the once concrete roads. We hired one such boat to take us to the destination. It is one of the most thrilling and exciting moments of my life which I will cherish forever.

Sometimes the field investigators have to cross rivers and streams to reach a destination with no facilities of boats to ferry them. Nidhi, one such field investigator, narrates: I was part of one such survey during the 2009 Lok Sabha polls where there was a time when a river lay in front of us, but there were no facilities of boats plying to cross the river. Since the water was knee deep, I decided to wade through the water.

Such experiences can be exciting if the field investigators are motivated and find the work exciting. Sometimes, the field investigators may have to travel on elephant backs to reach the location, as in Assam. Mohit, who travelled to the interiors of Assam narrates, “Travelling on elephant back is expensive, but at the same time extremely thrilling. I travelled on elephant back during my

122

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

field research days in Assam as there were no other means of public transport.” Cultural diversities in the country are wide ranging, it is multilingual, multi-caste, multi-class, multi-cuisine, multi-dress, with people from various religions residing together. Sometimes, it is difficult for the field investigator to blend easily with voters from such cultural, religious, and ethnic diversities. Sudhi, a field investigator for election survey narrates: I once did a field investigation at a tribal belt of Chhattisgarh. There is a general fear embedded in public logic about conducting field study in tribal belt. Although it was a bit difficult for me initially to strike a friendship with the tribals considering they have a very different way of life and ways of living, so that they would answer the questionnaire, but once the initial step was crossed, they proved to be extremely hospitable.

There are certain states and regions in India with a high level of political disturbances and are classified as high security risk zones. Conducting fieldwork in such trouble prone areas may prove to be exciting but at the same time challenging and fraught with risk. Although there are security concerns on the part of the field investigators in such states and regions especially since the questionnaire deals at times with very sensitive issue which is highly debatable in the political circles, at the same time it is extremely exciting and satisfying on the part of the field investigators if they are successful in filling up the questionnaire. In India, there are three such regions: (a) Jammu and Kashmir due to the separatist movements; (b) Maoist affected areas in Jharkhand, Bihar, and Chhattisgarh; and (c) Andhra Pradesh where the movement for the creation of a separate state of Telangana is underway. Security is also a matter of concern for the field investigators in regions of the country affected by the Maoist problems. Rohit, who conducted fieldwork in Jharkhand, argues: Although we generally perceive the entire states of Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh and Orissa to be Maoist infested, this perception



Fieldwork and Data Collection

123

is far from reality. In most of these places fieldwork can be conducted, although it is only in around 4–5 villages which are actually secluded and are risky to travel.

The challenge of conducting fieldwork begins with the general belief in people’s mind that conducting fieldwork in such terrorist/ Maoist affected areas is not possible. Whenever a field investigator is randomly selected to conduct field investigation in any such place, there is generally a sense of fear and panic in the mind of the family members and friends regarding their safety and wellbeing. There is also a sense of fear and apprehension in the minds of the researchers that such surveys might not be possible to be conducted at the ground level. At the same time, it should be kept in mind that there have been a large number of successful survey researches which have been conducted in such regions. Often it has been noted that the field investigators return with experiences which negate this perception. Amit who conducted field investigation notes: I was allowed to conduct the survey after I showed my questionnaire. In such situations, it is very important that the field work is conducted in neutral circumstances, with no controversial questions which show that our allegiance is not with any party. So since in my questionnaire, we had asked questions both about Maoists as well as state atrocities, a sense of neutrality was apparent, which helped us to conduct the survey.

However, at the same time, it is important to note that if for some reason the investigator is denied permission to conduct the survey, it is advisable that for security reasons the survey be dropped. The second region where conducting fieldwork is a major challenge is Jammu and Kashmir due to the presence of separatists and terrorist outfits in the valley. The CSDS conducted the first election survey in Jammu and Kashmir in 2002 which was crosssectional and covered the Kashmir valley and the Leh-Ladakh region. The survey witnessed a plethora of fieldwork difficulties and problems in the Kashmir region of the state due to security

124

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

reasons. Rakesh, one of the two field investigators who visited the state for this purpose, shares his experience with us: The questionnaire was designed to understand the popular perception and opinion of the people living in the valley about the separatist movement and the support for Kashmir independence. The supporters of the separatist movement however had doubts about the purpose of our study. Therefore, they asked us to stay at an undisclosed location for two days, while during that time, they studied the questionnaire in great detail, and also verified our credentials and that of the organization we worked for. When they realized that our study is not backed by any political motive but was aimed at understanding the popular perceptions of the people, they gave in and later readily cooperated with us.

The third region/state where conducting survey operations runs into difficulties and hurdles in recent times is Andhra Pradesh. The CSDS recently conducted a survey in Andhra Pradesh on the question of Telangana issues which proved to be quite a challenging and arduous task. In the Telangana region, there is a considerable section of the population who are in favor of creating a separate state of Telangana and agitation over it is going since the last few years. In the Telangana region, the fieldwork was opposed by the ardent supporters of the Telangana movement as they felt the questionnaire was opposed to the movement and it could be conducted only in one of the townships in the region. The field investigators tried to explain and clarify their doubts but they were denied access and were asked to leave the town immediately by the next train. Raunak who was part of this team which visited the Telangana region said: We tried a lot for an entire day to explain that the survey was not conducted by any political party and it is being done by an independent social science research institute located in Delhi but still they denied us the permission. Since they asked us to leave and appeared to be hostile towards us, we thought the best option would be to abandon the field work.

7 Analyzing Data and Reporting Survey Findings

The final stage of measuring voting behavior is the process of data processing and reporting the survey findings in the public domain. As soon as the fieldwork is completed, the filled in questionnaires are manually checked. At this first stage of checking, all the filled in questionnaires are manually checked for identifying human errors and mistakes. The first level of data checking is generally done in the field or at the local headquarters, by the supervisor or the local level coordinator. In any national survey, it is essential that the first check of the filled in questionnaire should be done at a local level due to diversity in language. Though the survey questionnaire has mostly close-ended questions, there are few open-ended questions for which detailed answers are recorded that too in local language. The text written in the local language is best to be read, checked, and coded at the local level, i.e., at the state level in any all-India survey. The second stage of data checking is done normally by the central team, which coordinates the entire process of conducting election surveys. Since any survey relates to interviewing a large number of respondents, the use of computers becomes necessary for the analysis of the data. After manual screening and cleaning of the questionnaire is completed, the data are entered into an electronic format and subjected to coding and punching controls. The data punched are electronically checked for eligibility criteria, range, and logic errors and edited through specially written edit

126

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

programs. The errors that cannot be rectified by the software program are then printed as a “dump” that is manually verified from the source questionnaires and corrected accordingly. The completion of data entry and processing leads to creation of an electronic data file, which forms the base for data analysis and reporting the findings of the election survey. Data processing is a standardized method of data checking and cleaning that is followed by most of the polling agencies or research institutes in India while conducting election surveys. In comparison there are no standard formats or parameters that are followed while reporting the findings of the voting behavior and attitudes by polling organizations in the country. Elections are a regular feature in India with one or more states going to polls almost every year to elect their representatives and general elections once in five years. Opinion polls to measure the voting behavior and attitudes have also become quite popular in the country. The findings of the election surveys are reported in the Indian media during the elections with the main focus on forecasting results, i.e., predicting which party is likely to get how many seats and what proportion of votes that party may get in that particular election. Apart from election forecasting, the main findings of the election survey are also reported in detail along with a brief note on the method of sampling, the number of voters interviewed, locations where the polls were conducted, and the time frame of the survey. But most of the polling organizations do not provide information related to the survey like the details of the sampling method and complete sample profile, the margin of error in the survey, the profile of non-response voters, and the statistical models used for converting votes into seats. The reporting of basic information and technical details of the survey is as vital as the findings as it makes the poll more transparent and credible. Thus it becomes imperative to discuss in detail the correct procedure for reporting election survey findings and essential information about the survey that should be shared in the public domain. This chapter is divided into two sections. The first section discusses in detail the essential information of election surveys that



Analyzing Data and Reporting Survey Findings

127

should be reported along with the main findings. The findings of election survey are basically quantitative in nature and the data are analyzed and explained to the audience. The language of the analysis should be carefully and cautiously worded because if the findings are not properly presented, it can become controversial and questionable. There are some laid down parameters and guidelines that should be followed while reporting data from the surveys conducted during elections. The survey findings are generalizations based on the voters’ opinion and suggestive or indicative in explaining the voting behavior and attitudes of the electorate. It should not give the readers/audience the sense the findings conclusively prove a point or a fact. The survey should report the name of the polling organization, the purpose of conducting the survey, the methodology of the survey, and the dates when the fieldwork was conducted. The reason behind reporting these details of the survey and care and caution to be followed while reporting survey data will also be discussed in a detailed manner. The second section deals with the technical aspect of the election survey that should be reported with the findings. These include the method followed in fixing the margin of error in the share and fixing the vote share for different political parties. Similarly the election survey that forms the basis of making seat forecasts should reveal the statistical model used in converting vote estimates into the seat predictions for the political parties in fray. This section also tries to probe the challenges in making an accurate seat forecast during the elections and the limitations of the various forecasting models used by polling organizations in India.

Essential Information of Survey Reporting In recent years, sample surveys have become a popular tool in social science research and media for measuring the opinion of the people on current and topical issues. Research in electoral politics is also heavily dependent on survey techniques and methods for measuring the voting behavior and attitudes of electorates.

128

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

However, the findings of various election surveys and polls that have been reported in newspapers, magazines, and research journals have created a clear-cut cleavage among the readers as some tend to believe it completely while there are others who do not believe them at all. The reason for not believing the findings of election surveys stems from the fact that some survey reports do not report the complete details of the poll leading to suspicion among the readers about the polls and accuracy of the data. Thus it becomes vital that while reporting the findings of the survey, the following information about the survey should also be shared with the audience.

Sampling Method and Profile of Voters The important information that should be reported with the election survey findings is the sampling technique used for selecting the sampled constituencies, locations within constituencies, and finally how the voters were selected at the sampled locations. The method of sampling followed should be reported in a transparent manner with complete information to establish the credibility and public accountability of the election survey. A scan of election survey reports during the last decade reveals that most of the polling organizations in India do not provide complete information about the sampling method and processes used for their polls. Among social science research organizations, which conduct research on voting behavior, CSDS is an exception. Findings of all the voting behavior studies conducted by the CSDS reported in the print and electronic media are accompanied with a detailed methodological note with special focus on sampling. The sampling method used for voting behavior studies is generally the multistage systematic random sampling technique and the process of randomization is followed at each stage of sampling. On the other hand, commercial agencies that conduct voting behavior studies do report that they adopted a scientific method for selecting the location and voters. But a deeper probe into the sampling methodology reveals that



Analyzing Data and Reporting Survey Findings

129

random method is only used during the selection of assembly/parliamentary constituencies. The selection of sample locations and voters is mostly done using the convenience sampling technique, which does not ensure complete randomness as enumerators’ bias and errors creep in during selection of locations and voters. Thus this sampling method cannot be classified as random sampling in the strict sense of the term and reporting them as random and scientific is not either correct or ethical from viewpoint of survey ethics.

Purpose of the Survey and Other Details The report of an election survey should reveal the purpose for which the poll was conducted, so that the audience can relate the findings with the aim and objective of the survey. The main aim of every election survey is to measure the voting behavior and attitudes of the electorates but the purpose for which the findings are used is varied and diverse. The purpose could be from finding out the opinion and views of the voters on electoral issues by media for public debates and for election forecasting. On the other hand, research organization like CSDS conducts election studies to find out the voting behavior and attitudes of the electorate for research purposes. The findings of the survey are used for conducting postmortem analysis of the election verdict based on voters’ electoral behavior and choices. Apart from the election surveys conducted by the media and research institutions, there are suspect polls or private polls conducted by political parties. These polls are conducted with the sole purpose of finding out the electoral prospects of the party and candidates and for political communication. The public reports of these kinds of polls are treated with suspect as they are alleged to manipulate the data for tactically wooing the voters and furthering their political interests. The real purpose of the survey and the identity of the organization that conduct such polls surveys are never revealed and they are responsible for creating a bad name for election polling in India.

130

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

The crucial information that should be reported with the purpose of the election polls is the source of financing the survey. The lack of information about the source of funding for surveys on social and economic topics is not a serious issue as compared with election polls. The reason behind this is that the findings are not very sensitive and it cannot be manipulated to cause any direct implications in the public sphere. However, revealing the source of funding of election survey is very important as the sanctity and credibility of the survey depends to a great extent upon the credentials of the organization that funds the survey. Election surveys funded by national media, renowned funding agencies, and from public resources are considered credible and authentic and they do not go against the principle of free and fair elections. In comparison the opinion polls funded by the political parties are perceived as biased and manipulative in nature, so the source of funding of such surveys is never revealed to the public. Similarly, it is also essential to report the basic information of the polling agency or research organization that conducts the election surveys. The name and address along with the contact details of the polling organization should be reported with the survey findings. This information is essential as it helps the audience of the survey report to check the antecedents of the polling organization for confirming the authenticity and credibility of the polls. The contact details of the polling organization also provide the readers/viewers an opportunity to contact them for any clarifications. There are several modes of interviewing the sampled voters but for measuring the voting behavior and attitudes of electorates in India, most of the polling agencies generally use the face-to-face method. However, with technological advancement in survey research, new interviewing techniques are also employed by polling agencies like telephonic, web mail, and SMS (short messaging service). The survey report should clearly state the method of interviewing technique used for the poll. The survey report should also mention the locations where the voters were contacted and interviewed. The face-to-face interview of voters at their residence or place of work qualitatively differs from the interview of voters



Analyzing Data and Reporting Survey Findings

131

sampled and interviewed at street corners. The timings when the election survey was conducted should also be reported as surveys can be done before the elections, on the day of elections, and after the process of voting is over. The reporting of the timings of the data collection becomes very important for election opinion poll that is conducted for predicting the likely outcome of the elections. The reported timings of the election survey help the audience in deciding whether polls can be conclusively used for predicting the elections. Thus an election survey conducted several months before the actual election takes place will not be very accurate in making predications as compared with an opinion poll done a few days before the voting.

Sampling Error and Weightings in the Survey The findings of every election survey that are reported in the public sphere carry a rider that the survey has a margin of error that ranges from 3 to 5 percent. The reason for this arises from the fact that any number of samples statistically drawn from the same population will vary from each other and also from the true population simply because of the chance factor. The variation of the sample from the main characteristics of the universe is termed as sampling error or margin of error and the measure used to estimate it is called the standard error. Standard errors are statistical analysis of the survey to estimate how close or precise the achieved sample is to the true population. Sampling errors depend upon the sample size and how much sampling error can be tolerated in a survey (Salant and Dillman, 1994). Thus a national level election survey of 10,000 scientifically sampled Indian voters can accurately measure the voting behavior and attitudes of the electorates in the country. This means that if a survey is conducted on 10,000 statistically sampled voters, it would yield approximately the same results if a survey is hypothetically done among all the voters in the country with a very small margin of error. Similarly, if two samples of 10,000 voters are drawn from the total electorates in India and

132

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

two separate surveys are conducted, there would be slight variation in the results of both the polls. The marginal difference in the findings of both the surveys would not mean that one of the polls was right and the other one was wrong. The variation in the survey results would be due to sampling error that is also called the margin of error. Standard error is not an error caused by mistake but it is a measure of the possible range of approximation in the results that occurs while conducting a sample survey. Sampling error is reported in every survey to show the degree of the certainty of results and the confidence level of the poll findings. The margin of error along with the confidence level is statistically used to verify the accuracy of the survey and its degree of precision. Election surveys in India generally report the margin of error, varying anything between three to five percentage points with 95 percent confidence levels. The 95 percent confidence level indicates that the election survey findings would be within the range of three to five percentage points, 95 times out of 100 if 100 such surveys were conducted. The reporting of sampling error sometimes becomes a tricky and challenging problem if the survey data are used for predicting the elections and making seat forecasts. For example, if there are two major political parties in the fray and the survey finding reveals that the gap in vote share between them is less than the margin of error, then forecasting becomes vulnerable and chances of getting the forecast or prediction wrong become very high. The best way in such situations is to caution the readers in the report that because of the slender difference in the vote share of the two parties, the predictions can go wrong as the final figures may change after the election results. If the election survey shows that the gap in the vote share of the two major political formations is equal to or more than the error margin, then only results of the elections should be forecast with certainty. There is a mention of weightages that have been applied for data analysis in most of the election surveys and it is reported with the findings. Weightages are statistical methods for balancing the data on sample profiles and adjusting the vote shares of the



Analyzing Data and Reporting Survey Findings

133

political parties. Opinion polls on elections that use probability sampling provide every voter an equal chance of being selected out of the total electorate. Unequal chances of selection occur when researchers use disproportionate sampling methods to ensure that there are enough cases of various subgroups of voters for comparative analysis. For example, if in a village there are 4,000 Hindu voters and 1,000 Muslim voters and the polling organization plans to do a comparative analysis of their voting behavior and attitudes, applying equal randomization would yield unequal samples. Thus if 10 percent of the voters have to be randomly sampled from both the subgroups, then 400 Hindu and 100 Muslim voters would be selected. The sample of 100 Muslim voters will be small and disproportionate for comparative analysis. The sampling error would be high and also the number of interviews for analysis would be further reduced on disaggregation on variables like caste community, education, class, etc., and become insignificant. To avoid this problem, disproportionate sampling at 10 percent for Hindus and 40 percent for Muslims would be required to get the same sample. But if the estimates have to be made at the aggregate level for the whole, electorate weights have to be used in the sample to adjust for the unequal chances of selection. The purpose of weighting is to ensure that generalization from the sample can be done despite the fact that some groups are over or underrepresented.

Election Forecasting and Seat Predictions One of the difficult aspects of any pre-poll election survey is to accurately measure the vote share of different political parties that they are mostly likely to get in the forthcoming elections. The correct estimation of the vote share of the parties by the survey is crucial as it forms the base on which seat forecasts are done for the political parties in the fray and predicting the likely outcomes of the elections. The correct estimation and reporting of the vote share of the parties also reflects the accuracy levels of

134

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

the survey in measuring the voting behavior and attitudes of the electorates. However, the most difficult aspect of election survey reporting is predicting the numbers of seats likely to be won by various political parties based on vote estimates. The conversion of vote share estimates into seats, which parties are likely to win, is done by using the election forecasting model, which is both technical as well as tricky. The uneven success rate of election forecasts done by polling organizations in India in the last two decades reveals that they are quite complicated and challenging in nature. The early phase of seat predictions for general elections in the 1990s based on surveys was quite successful as predictions done by the polling industry were nearly accurate. However, the seat predictions during the last two general elections held in 2004 and 2009 were off the mark raising suspicions about the authenticity of election surveys and the credibility of the polling agencies who conducted them. Thus it becomes necessary to find out the various seat prediction models developed and used by polling organizations in India and the limitations and challenges of forecasting elections in India. The credit for developing a statistical model for election forecasting and predicting the elections goes to the father of opinion polling industry in India, Eric De Costa, head of the Indian Institute of Public Opinion (IIPO), Delhi. The first election survey conducted in 1957 by IIPO predicted the victory of Congress with a nearly accurate seat forecast. De Costa estimated the vote share of the parties and used the multiplier effect methodology for predicting the seats likely to be won by the political parties in electoral competition. The multiplier was calculated as a percent of seats for a party divided by the percentage of votes polled in the last Lok Sabha election. This model worked quite well before the 1957 general elections for election forecasting but failed to make accurate predictions in the subsequent surveys as the multiplier varied from election to election. Thus the multiplier effect model could be used only for predicting bipolar contests but did not work later with the growth and increase in the number of political parties in the country.



Analyzing Data and Reporting Survey Findings

135

Dr Prannoy Roy did the next stage in the development of a statistical model for forecasting elections in India. Dr Roy developed a prediction model based on the generalized measure of vote splitting called Index of Opposition Unity (IOU). The model was designed to isolate the splitting of votes from the normal measure of change in popularity of the party that is termed as swing of votes. This model uses both the components of “swing” and “split” on vote share for the dominant party and the opposition parties for making seat forecast. For calculating IOU, the vote of the largest opposition party is divided by the sum of votes of all the opposition parties multiplied by 100. The IOU figure that is arrived at by this calculation varies from 0 to 100 depending upon the number of political parties that is in opposition to the incumbent or the ruling party. A higher IOU figure clearly shows a greater unity and cohesiveness of the opposition political parties. According to this model, a realistic IOU to measure the change or swing of votes in elections has three components: (a) measure the cohesiveness of the opposition and keenness to compete in the elections; (b) any change in the index can compare with the change in the votes as well as a margin of the victory; and (c) it should be simple enough to be used at multi-levels like constituency, region, and the country (Butler et al., 1995). This method also worked quite accurately in making seat forecasts when two major parties contested the elections, but its limitation was exposed as it does not work very well in multi-polar contests and when the swing of votes is very heterogeneous and fractured. A new model for election prediction was used by the APT Research Group during the Assembly Elections held in the state of Tamil Nadu in 2001. The group conducted a pre-election survey the findings of which were reported in the Frontline magazine along with the statistical formula used to convert vote shares of dominant parties into seat predictions. The model was based on a modified version of the “Cube Law” which has been found appropriate for converting vote shares into seats when there is a bipolar contest. The “Cube Law” states that if vote shares of the two main political formations in a first-past-the-post electoral system

136

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

are “a” and “b,” their seats will be in the ratio of a3 to b3. The prediction model developed on cube law factored in specificities of Indian elections like multi-polarity and other factors and made adjustments accordingly for making the seat forecast. But again a forecasting model developed on the formula of cube law like the other models of seat forecasting does not work well in electoral competitions where there are more than two major political formations in the fray. Dr Rajeeva Karandikar, a well-regarded statistician and probabilistic theorist developed a statistical model called the probabilistic count method for converting the vote share into the number of seats for political parties in the elections. This model takes into account the existing political realities on the one hand and expertise in mathematical modeling. This technique is based on voters’ behavior gathered by opinion polls which is used in conjunction with past election data. Thus the prediction model of voting behavior of individual voters is used to calculate the percentage of votes for a party in a constituency. The model works on the assumption that the change in the percentage of votes for a given party from the previous election to the present remains constant across a given state. The resulting model is not very accurate but is a reasonably good approximation to predict the seats for major political parties at a national level. The model calculates the change in the percentage of votes for political parties popularly called “Swing” from an opinion poll and estimates the swing for each party in each state. Based on the swing of votes calculated from the past data, the vote estimate for each party in each state is fixed. For bigger states, the swing of votes in each seat is calculated in a combination using both region-wise and state-wise swing. The probability of a candidate winning in each constituency is calculated and summing over the probabilities over all the 543 Lok Sabha seats. The expected number of seats for each party is forecast at the national level. This forecasting model has predicted the election outcomes in India correctly many times in the last few years but a couple of inaccurate predictions show that it is still far from being completely perfect in making accurate seat predictions.



Analyzing Data and Reporting Survey Findings

137

G.S. Gill, Lecturer, Institute of Instrumentation Engineering, Kurukshetra University, Kurukshetra, Haryana, made an attempt to develop an artificial neural network model for forecasting election results. He says that neural networks can be trained to recognize patterns in the data that other computing and statistical techniques might fail to identify and once trained the network can then be used to make accurate electoral “forecasts.” The model aimed at forecasting the outcome of Lok Sabha elections in India but is still in the development stage as the preliminary enquiries revealed that it could not cross the threshold of becoming a viable and successful model. The model could not take into account all peculiarities of the Indian voting system, factors such as vote splitting as well as local factors so it is still in the experimental and research stage (Gill, 2005).

Challenges in Forecasting Election Results During the last few decades various models have been developed for election forecasting. Thus we see that the statistical models developed and used by various organizations are still not full proof as they fail to factor in the peculiarities of elections in India and also suffer from certain inherent limitations. Models were developed keeping in mind the dominant nature of party competition in India. But election forecasting in India possesses a big challenge since the nature of party competition varies from state to state and even within the state it may vary from election to election. What adds to the challenge for making forecasts is the split within an existing party between two elections, the merger of two parties and more recently the alliance between political parties which often change from one election to another. All these possess the challenge for developing the base file of votes polled by different parties during the last elections held in that state which is most essential in any forecasting model. When the spilt takes place in a political party between two elections, there is always a subjective judgment involved in artificially estimating the vote for

138

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

that party assuming that party had contested the last assembly elections. Besides these challenges, there are other challenges in election forecasting. The seat forecasting in elections may go wrong because, at times opinion polls conducted in a few sampled constituencies fail to capture determinants like geographical concentration of votes for political parties in some constituencies, some regions of states, multi-polarity of electoral contest and high levels of electoral volatility in Indian elections. Yogendra Yadav rightly puts the reason for inaccurate prediction of seats or challenge in making seat forecasts as “diversity, regional differences, and a high degree of volatility.” The number of people who change their mind between two elections is extraordinarily high (the Indian Express, January 27, 2008). The second major limitation of seat prediction arises from the fact that the vote share gathered from surveys and the method by which it is adjusted into final vote shares brings in an element of domain knowledge and subjective judgment. The statistical tools and models used for converting votes for political parties into seats likely to be won is based on adjusted and extrapolated vote share for parties. Thus forecasts based on human assumptions often go awry and all polling organizations employ their own specific methods for converting vote shares into seat shares. There is an element of arbitrariness in the methodology by which the percentage of vote shares of various political formations as derived from expressed voting intentions of sample respondents are converted into Lok Sabha seats for them (Athreya, 1998). The different nature of political contests that takes place in various conglomerates of states in India also poses a serious challenge for pollsters in making correct seat predictions and electoral forecasts. It is relatively easier to make seat forecasts in states which witness a bipolar contest between the two major political parties like that in the states of Chhattisgarh, Delhi, Gujarat, Himachal Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, and Uttarakhand. These states have neither witnessed a stable bi-party



Analyzing Data and Reporting Survey Findings

139

contest without any major split in the two national parties, the Congress and the BJP nor do these states witness any merger of any significant political parties with them. It is relatively easier to develop a statistical model for forecasting seats in such states and one should expect more or less accurate seat prediction with estimates of vote share being within one to 2 percent of the actual vote share. The challenge for making seat forecasts in the states where there are electoral contests is largely between two political alliances like Bihar, Kerala, Maharashtra, Punjab, Orissa (till recently before the 2009 Lok Sabha elections), Tamil Nadu, and West Bengal even though the various political parties in the electoral fray are less compared to states which witness a multiparty contest. This is precisely because even though various political parties are contesting elections (Tamil Nadu is an appropriate example), finally the electoral contest is treated as bipolar since all the parties side with one or the other alliance. In such electoral contests, forecasting of seats and the vote share for the alliance may be easy, but difficult for every political party in the alliance separately. That is not the only challenge in forecasting elections in the bipolar alliance contest. Even such bipolar contest possess challenges for election forecasting when either political parties shift from one alliance to another or move out of the alliance. Shifting of political parties from one alliance to another is a regular feature in Tamil Nadu which possesses challenges of its own kind in making election forecasts. Similar breaking of the alliance and alliance parties contesting elections separately (Orissa in 2009) poses a challenge for election forecasting. The bigger challenge is when there is a spilt in one of the alliance partners and the splinter party decides to contest elections independently like in Punjab during the 2012 Assembly Elections when Manpreet Badal spilt/ moved out of his parent political party, Akali Dal. He formed his own party People’s Party of Punjab (PPP) and contested the 2012 Assembly elections opposing both the Congress and the Akali

140

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

Dal–BJP alliance. Such splits pose big problems in developing the base file (vote share of political parties during previous elections) and making simulated estimates of vote share of the new party for an election which it had not contested or we can say when the party did not even exist. The problem faced for making seat forecasts due to the split in political parties is even greater in some of the states in the northeastern parts of India, like Mizoram, Manipur, Nagaland, or Arunachal Pradesh where parties appear and disappear between two elections. The dangers fraught in making seat forecasts is incomplete if we do not mention the challenge in forecasting election results in states like Uttar Pradesh, Assam, Jammu and Kashmir, and Jharkhand, which witness multi-polar contests. Forecasting seats is difficult in First-Past-the-Post (FTPT) electoral systems, and it becomes much more difficult in states which witness multiparty contests. The existing forecasting models can take into account the possibility of a large number of seats being decided by a very small margin of votes. The possibility of winning with a slender margin of votes is much higher in multiparty contests as compared to the states which witness bipolar contests. This leads to higher errors while making seat forecasts. The final and the most important reason why the opinion polling industry in India has not been able to stamp its authority in the art of election forecasting is due to the lack of sharing knowledge and research and development (R&D). The art of election forecasting is still very young in our country and the take-off point was the early 1980s when Dr Prannoy Roy made the most outstanding innovations in election surveys. However, various polling organizations which have developed their own forecasting models have kept it secretly guarded and have taken no steps to bring it in the public domain for discussion and develop it further. Thus election forecasting models that are used by polling organizations suffer from limitations and developing sophisticated statistical models is still a far cry. A renowned psephologist Yogendra Yadav feels that the forecasting protocols in



Analyzing Data and Reporting Survey Findings

141

India have not been fully developed nor are they in the public domain (the Indian Express, January 27, 2008). Another expert on elections Yashwant Deshmukh also agrees with this opinion and he says that the opinion polling industry has not matured in India and there is no R&D work. Electorates do not behave in the same way in the Lok Sabha and assembly polls and so the lessons learnt in one election survey can only be tested in the next election (the Indian Express, May 9, 2004).

8 Limitations and Emerging Challenges

The challenges and problems posed in measuring voting behavior in India are quite varied and complex as compared with most of the democratic countries in the first world. The challenges in conducting election surveys in India arise from a variety of reasons like the geographical span of the country, the highest number of electorates in the world, the existing sociocultural and demographic diversities, proliferation of political parties, the changing nature of party competition, and the rapidly changing domain knowledge and technology for polling around the world. The unique character of the Indian electorate coupled with the changing nature of Indian polity based on identity politics and intra-group competition has created new sets of challenges in measuring voting behavior and attitudes. Unlike countries in the western world, where the nature of the electorate is homogenous, voters in India are highly heterogeneous with a wide range of diversity in terms of region, language, religion, caste community, and ethnicity. The diverse and non-homogenous character of the Indian electorate poses a big challenge for studying the opinion and attitudes of the voters with reasonable confidence. The diversity is reflected not only in terms of their political preferences and choices but also in their voting behavior making it a difficult task to accurately measuring voting behavior in India. The measurement of voting behavior in most democratic countries is not a very complex task as the electoral competition



Limitations and Emerging Challenges

143

is limited to two dominant parties based on the bi-party system. On the other hand, independent India’s experiment with electoral politics was based on the multiparty system. However, the dominance of the Congress party in the initial years made the task of measuring voting behavior and attitudes of the voters quite simple and easy. The end of the dominance of the Congress party in the 1990s and the fragmentation of the united opposition led to the growth and ascendancy as there are more political parties at the national level and regional parties in a number of states. This led to the beginning of multiparty competition and fragmentation of significant votes among more political parties making the task of measuring voting behavior much more challenging and complex. The limitations of opinion poll-based election studies and its criticism began in the 1970s. Academicians pointed out that election surveys held in the last two decades failed to bring forward any expertise in understanding and explaining the voting behavior of the Indian electorate. Even the specialized skills developed in predicting the electoral outcome was not foolproof as predictions seldom went wrong. The biggest criticism leveled against election studies was that its contribution in arriving at any precise formulations about the political behavior of the Indian voters has been marginal and in a limited sense. The 1990s saw not only the growth of opinion polling ind­ustry on elections but also more criticisms and limitations of survey research in measuring voting behavior in India. Apart from academic questions on the scope and relevance of election surveys, the polling industry also got mired in public controversy and questioning. It was alleged that election surveys encroached upon the free and fairness of elections by vitiating the opinion of the electorates. There were allegations that the findings of the election surveys were tampered and used as potent tool to swing the opinion of the voters for political gain. This led to public litigations to curb polling on elections and putting restriction on election surveys. As a result of this the Election Commission of India (ECI) has imposed a blanket ban on the dissemination of election survey findings during the election period.

144

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

Thus it becomes important to find out in detail the challenges and hurdles faced by the opinion poll industry on elections in the various phases of its growth and the measures taken by the polling agencies to address these issues. This chapter will be divided into three sections. The first section deals with the challenges and problems confronted in conducting election surveys in the initial years and would extend up to the 1990s. The periodization of challenges and problems faced by the polling industry is not divided into two phases to coincide with the phases of its growth and development, but because the problems and hurdles in each of the phases were quite different and distinct from each other. This section also addresses the limitations of the relevance and scope of election studies in India. The academic criticisms that election surveys do not further the knowledge of electoral patterns and behavior will also be discussed in detail and on merits. The second section maps the challenges faced in conducting election surveys in the 1990s and thereafter. It will showcase not only how the challenges in measuring voting behavior differed from the first phase systemically but also due to the changing polity in India and the nature of electoral competitions. The final section would be on the raging public controversy in the 1990s that election surveys are used to bias and change the opinion of the voters and litigations to curb its use during the election period. This section will discuss in detail the status quo of the polling industry and the imposition of institutional curbs in conducting election surveys. It will also probe whether the reasons stated by the ECI for imposing ban on showing survey findings during the election period is justified or not. This section will also deliberate and find out whether election surveys have a negative effect in conducting free and fair elections and its impact on changing the voting decision of the electorates.

Challenges in the Beginning Phase The beginning phase of measuring the electoral behavior using the survey method was marked with much enthusiasm and zeal



Limitations and Emerging Challenges

145

but it was also accompanied with major challenges and problems. Like starting any new enterprise or industry in independent India witnessed severe infrastructural as well as financial constraints and the situation was no different for the polling industry. There existed no domain knowledge or expertise and financial resources were also not available to support opinion polling on elections. The lack of methods, processes, and practices required for conducting election survey left no options to those interested in election survey research but to either go to the USA or the UK to learn survey research methods and techniques. Thus for IIPO to conduct its first election poll in 1957, it had to take not only expertise and skills from Gallup International USA but also financial support. The learning of methods of election survey research and acquiring domain expertise from the Western world had its advantages as well as disadvantages. One of the biggest limitations was that the survey method learned from the USA and the UK could not be replicated in India in its original form. The features and techniques developed by opinion polling agencies in the USA and the UK were indigenous and more suited for studying the homogenous character of the electorate in these countries. Unlike them, India is a country with a heterogeneous electorate and their political choices and behavior is significantly divided in terms of language, religion, caste community, and ethnicity. Thus the biggest challenge that arose was to adapt the methods and techniques learned from the western world and customize them in the Indian context and settings. The popular modes of conducting election surveys in the USA and UK were mail surveys, telephonic surveys, and surveys in faceto-face situation. However, in India, election surveys since its inception were conducted in face-to-face methods due to a lack of the postal communication network in the country and penetration of telephones among the electorate. Though this method of conducting surveys is considered one of the best, it had some inherent limitations and drawbacks. The biggest limitation of this method is that it is highly financial and manpower intensive. As compared with other modes of survey like mail and telephonic, the financial

146

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

and manpower resources required are the highest. Further this method is also a very time-consuming and lengthy process requiring a large number of field investigators and supervisors. The designing, operationalizing, and measuring of the voting behavior were also major challenges during this period. The designing stage of an all India election survey posed a serious challenge arising due to the diverse language and dialects spoken by the electorate in the country and the need for translating the interview schedules. For the survey, the interview schedules and other tools had to be translated into so many languages and dialects which in itself was an arduous and time-consuming task. The questionnaire is considered to be the most important tool for measuring voting behavior as it allows for standardization of the survey. Standardization ensures that the questions are asked by the field enumerators to all sampled respondents in a similar manner so as to solicit standard or accurate responses. Thus care needs to be taken that the translation of the questionnaire did not alter the original meaning of the words and questions during the translation work. But this seldom happened due to a lack of trained and experienced translators of the various languages in the country. The translation of questionnaires into several languages and dialects was not only a rigorous task but also involved high costs and investment. The second stage after the designing and testing of survey instruments involves conducting the fieldwork for data collection. The fieldwork of any survey is one of the most challenging and daunting tasks as it involves contacting the respondents, getting their informed consent, and conducting the interview. Fieldwork during this phase had two major bottlenecks. One the fieldwork staff required had to have some experience and exposure to survey research and interviewing techniques. However, there was an absence of trained manpower in survey research as the exposure to survey methods was new in India. Since the resources available for conducting surveys was quite limited, the investment in training was almost impossible. The lack of proper training of the field enumerators led to biases and subjectivity of the interviewers creeping in the surveys. As a result, the election surveys conducted



Limitations and Emerging Challenges

147

in the initial phases were quite high in measurement errors and other margins of errors. Second, the infrastructural facility like communication was very poor, which created problems for the field investigation team to reach the designated places and contact the sampled respondents for conducting the interviews. This resulted in high non-response errors in the election surveys. The absence of computing and analysis of data collected was a major limitation during this period. Thus there were no modern day technologies like computers and software for data analysis which made data collation and analysis a cumbersome process. The whole process was done either manually or through tapes and it was a very time taking and arduous job and fraught with risks of various computing and analysis errors. The opinion polls conducted during this period for studying voting behavior in India was criticized on more than one account. First that political scientists in India adopted behavioralism from the west without having imbibed its methodological rigor or complex techniques. The tendency was to lean upon western researchers and emulate the techniques and methodologies which notably figured in the field of electoral studies in Western countries (Ahmad, 1977). This criticism does hold ground as the election studies conducted during this period did borrow the survey techniques and methods mainly from the University of Michigan and American Institute of Public Opinion. However, attempts were made to examine the question of adequacy or suitability of using the survey techniques employed in America in the Indian context. Based on this, appropriate modifications and adaptation were done in the research techniques to measure electoral behavior and patterns in India. Second that election studies proliferated extensively over the last two decades but they have failed to equip us with any expertise either in the anticipation and prediction of electoral outcomes or in understanding electoral processes generally (Ahmad, 1977). The first contention that the opinion poll-based election studies failed to bring forward any expertise and specialized skills required for predicting the electoral outcomes holds true not only

148

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

for this period but also for the present time. But the criticisms that election studies failed in its attempt in understanding and explaining the voting behavior of the Indian electorates need to be taken with a pinch of salt. Ahmad himself goes on to say in the same article that he is not arguing for abandoning election studies in India. He says that while its predictive capability is limited, they still can provide a cumulative and long-term view of the processes of politicization of the electorate and development of India’s political system. Finally, the biggest limitation of election studies was that its contribution in arriving at any precise formulations about the political behavior of the Indian electorate has been marginal and limited (Ahmad, 1977). This criticism of election studies and its limitations in measuring voting behavior during this period are critical and relevant. But it should be remembered that this was the beginning phase of election studies in India and for any initiative to become a discipline needs a gestation period and research and development over the years.

Challenges in Second Phase—1990 Onwards The challenges of measuring voting behavior in India became more complex and complicated from the 1990s onwards as compared with the earlier phase. There are many reasons that contributed to the growing complexity and intricacy in measuring the opinion and attitudes of Indian voters. The two main macro-level factors that made the task measuring the voting behavior difficult were the changing nature of democratic politics in India and the shift in the focus and priorities of the polling industry on elections. Electoral politics saw new developments like multi-polarity of contests, party alliances, and transfer of votes to each other and the geographical concentration of votes for political parties. Electoral competition in this period also witnessed sharpening of factionalism in parties, rebel candidates, and maneuvering at the local levels which is impossible to ascertain by an election survey. The



Limitations and Emerging Challenges

149

proliferation of media in this period and their penchant for election surveys and result forecasting also led to a change in the election polling industry. The main focus of election surveys shifted from measuring voting behavior of the Indian electorates to seat predictions and election forecasting. These two factors along with other factors will be dealt with in detail in this section to provide a holistic picture of the challenges involved in conducting election surveys and capturing the complexities of Indian elections. The 1990s marked the end of single party dominance of the Congress party and the emergence of viable and significant opposition parties. The end of the dominance of the Congress party led to consolidation and growth of more political parties at the national level and a number of regional parties at the state level. This led to the beginning of multiparty political competition and significant division of votes among more political parties. The task of measuring voting behavior and predicting elections in multi-polar contests with narrow difference in vote margins made the task of measuring voting behavior and attitudes of Indian electorate much more tricky and technical. In a state where there are two main political parties, it is much easier to forecast election outcomes if the survey gets their vote shares correctly. On the other hand, in states with multiparty competition, the task of seat predictions in elections becomes quite difficult as a slight error in estimating the vote share of any party can completely upset the forecast. A classic case of this happened during Assembly elections held in the state of Uttar Pradesh in 2007. Most of the polling agencies estimated the vote share of BSP which was just 2 percent less than the actual votes it polled. This small margin of a 2 percent gap in the vote share was enough to turn the apple carts of the polling industry as most of the polls failed to predict that BSP would win the elections with a clear majority. Thus election forecasting in multiparty competitions becomes a major challenge for the polling industry. The growth of media in this period made election surveys more popular but the focus shifted from measuring voting behavior of the Indian electorates to mainly seat predictions and election forecasting. The election forecasts made in general elections held in

150

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

the 1990s were mostly on target giving a big boost to the business of seat predictions. But election forecasts based on opinion polls done during general elections held in 2004 predicted that the incumbent coalition NDA would retain power at the centre but the results proved that all the polls went completely wrong. The failure of opinion poll-based predictions in 2004 posed a big challenge for the polling agencies and media and getting it right became the top-most priority during the general elections held in 2009. The poll predictions made by different media houses and poll pundits during the 2009 election showed that the Congressled UPA would be the largest alliance but once again none of the polls could predict that UPA would touch the majority mark. Thus predictions in elections still remain one of the biggest challenges in measuring voting behavior and making electoral forecasts and expose the limitations of survey research method. Election studies conducted in the initial years indicated that Indian voters are highly heterogeneous in sociocultural and demographic backgrounds which are reflected in their varied voting patterns and preferences. The multiple identities of Indian voters based on regional, caste community, linguistic, and religious identity overlap at times making it difficult to ascertain the patterns of their political affiliation and electoral behavior. Thus, for example, the Muslim community in a state like Uttar Pradesh does not vote for the right wing party BJP and has been reported by various election surveys conducted in the state in the last decade. This may be true about the Muslims’ voting patterns at the state level but would not be a true reflection of the variations in the voting behavior of the Muslim electorates living in different regions of the state. The reason is that Muslims in UP do not form a heterogeneous group and vote en bloc but there are differences in their voting patterns based on region, language, and sects. A few large sample surveys that have been conducted in the past have shown that certain sections of Muslims in the state have voted for the BJP. The multicultural and intra-community diversity of the electorate still continue to be a major challenge in measuring the opinion and attitudes of voters in India. The only way of capturing



Limitations and Emerging Challenges

151

the multilayer diversity and intricacies of the Indian electorate is by conducting a large sample survey that is not a challenging task but highly manpower and capital intensive. The change in electoral politics and the focus of the polling industry also coincided with changes in the voting behavior of the Indians. The electoral behavior of the voters witnessed major changes in the 1990s arising due to the beginning of identity politics in the country and sharpening of the sociopolitical cleavages. The Mandal Commission agitation and the Ramjanambhoomi controversy led to electoral polarization on caste, community and religious basis. The pola­rization of voters along caste and community lines created a unique problem as Indian voters who in the earlier phase revealed their true voting intentions to the election surveyors now started concealing or revealing the wrong answers. The reasons for this arose out of the fear that correct revelation of the party they voted could be used by other political parties in identifying and targeting them individually. This happened more with the backward and marginalized sections of the voters. However, this concealing of voting intention also happens in some circumstances among the upper caste dominant castes in India. A classic case of this happened during the Uttar Pradesh Assembly election held in 2007. In this election, a large number of voters from upper castes actually voted for BSP (Dalit party), but they did not report this during election surveys due to caste bias and the fear of reprisal from their caste community. As a result, most of the election surveys conducted during this election failed to ascertain the correct vote share for the BSP and predict its win. This period also saw a high degree of volatility among the Indian voters and a significant increase in the number of floating voters. Election studies done during the election campaign have revealed that around one fourth of the voters do not make up their mind about whom to vote for and stay in a state of flux. The floating voters make up their mind after the election campaigns and if there is a bandwagon effect in favor of any particular political party measuring the vote share of different political parties becomes not only difficult but also challenging and complex. Similarly the

152

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

voting patterns of voters in India have revealed that the impact of certain issues on voters is differential and sectional. For example, certain issues in elections may have regional and sectional appeal and can form a consideration for forming voting decisions. For others it may not have any appeal and may not affect their voting decisions at all. Thus the task of ascertaining sectional or local issues by sample surveys is one of the major shortcomings and limitations of this method. The most significant aspect for any opinion poll survey is its sample size and method of sampling. Though this can be statistically determined, in case of India it has always been a challenging aspect due to the various factors already discussed. A convenient way of determining the sample size for any national and state level election study during this period was evolved depending upon the level of analysis the polling agency intended to do. For studying the voting behavior and attitudes of voters at the state level, a sample survey of 1,500 voters was considered statistically significant. But if the survey intended to ascertain the voting behavior at the regional and subregional level in the state, then the sample selected would have to be bigger. The reason is that there should be sufficient numbers of cases for disaggregate analysis. Thus sample sizes for election surveys were decided upon the level of disaggregate data the survey wanted to collect and the popular belief that bigger sample surveys would provide more accurate seat predictions based on it. But this was a misconception as even a small sample size survey can accurately measure the opinion and attitudes of the voters and forecast correct results. On the contrary, a survey based on a big sample which is inaccurate will yield wrong data on voting behavior and inaccurate seat forecast. Yogendra Yadav says that there is no guarantee that a bigger sample size will get you the right result. Bigger surveys only multiply errors ten times (the Indian Express, January 27, 2008). The method of sampling used in election surveys by most polling agencies in India is far from accurate and yields an unrepresentative sample. Election studies in the past have indicated that



Limitations and Emerging Challenges

153

the voting preference of people belonging to various socioeconomic groups and caste communities is different. For example, in the state of Uttar Pradesh (UP), the majority of dalits, especially the Jatavas, have been voting for the BSP while the majority among the upper caste voters has been supporters of the BJP and the Congress. Similarly the voters belonging to the Yadav community have been staunch supporters of the Samajwadi Party. Thus the sample in the UP should be representative of these caste and communities approximate to the actual percentage of the population in the state. Political analyst Yogendra Yadav says that the crucial thing is not the size of the sample, but the method through which the sample is selected. Most Indian polls go wrong because their sampling methodology is so poor and therefore the sample profile is unrepresentative (the Indian Express, January 27, 2008). Thus the biggest challenge for election surveys in India during this period was its failure to adopt a scientific methodology and a representative sample for measuring voting behavior of the electorates. Another major challenge that arose during this period though not directly linked to measuring voting behavior was getting the vote share of political parties correct and based on the then made seat forecast for the parties. Though most of the election surveys during this period computed the vote share almost accurately, on several occasions they failed to make the right electoral forecasts. The reason for this was due to the growing peculiarities of elections in the country and the limitation in ascertaining them. The reasons were: (a) in many elections, political parties contested the elections in alliance with each other. Contesting the elections meant that both the parties transferred the vote to each other where they contested. This posed a serious challenge as it is very difficult to correctly compute the transfer of votes for each other and make seat predictions for them; (b) the geographical concentrations of votes for some parties in some regions or pockets of the states also make it difficult to make correct seat predictions. The result of the Karnataka Assembly election held in 2008 is a testimony of this fact. The surveys conducted in the state revealed

154

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

that the BJP had one percentage vote share less than the Congress in the election, but they were unable to forecast that it will win a majority of the seats in the election. The reason for this was that the votes for the BJP were more concentrated in some regions and pockets that translated in the BJP winning more seats. On the other hand, Congress votes were evenly distributed throughout the state leading to huge losses in the number of seats won; and (c) Indian elections witness more intra-party factionalism in this period and the cutting of votes of the official candidates by rebel candidates. The effect of rebel candidates and factional fighting at the local level could not be correctly ascertained by a sample survey. The opinion polls conducted for studying voting behavior in India was subjected to criticisms by Indian academia during this period. Like earlier periods election surveys still continue to be criticized as a direct import from the western world unsuited for studying electoral behavior. The sociocultural peculiarities and the settings of electoral politics in India were different and the election survey as a tool was ill-suited to capture the complexities. The label “survey research” stood for what was considered most inappropriate in the third world imitation of American science of politics. It was methodologically naïve, politically conservative and culturally inauthentic (Yadav, 2008). Election surveys were also criticized by those who conducted qualitative studies on the grounds that it revealed the broader patterns of electoral behavior in quantitative terms. The opinion and attitudes of individual voters revealed the general patterns and missed out on the specificities of political development. Thus the major limitation of the survey method was cited in its inability to capture the influence of local politics on the electoral behavior of small communities. A questionnaire administered to individual voters can elicit information about individual attitudes and opinions but cannot capture the larger reality of events involving a collectivity of individuals acting over a longer period of time (Shah, 2007).



Limitations and Emerging Challenges

155

Attempts to Curb Election Surveys and Its Impact on Voters The growth of opinion polling on elections in India in the 1990s witnessed not only new challenges and problems in conducting surveys but also got entangled into controversy and public scrutiny. The need for issuing guidelines for election surveys arose from the allegations that some election surveys were conducted by people with vested interests and its findings were disseminated in the public domain for vitiating the election process and manipulating the elections. The findings of such questionable surveys were purposively used for influencing the minds of the electorate and it had an adverse impact on the voters. The call for a ban of opinion polls and exit during the elections also arose on the ground that it contravened the constitutional provisions laid down for conducting free and fair elections in India. Thus voices were raised for imposition of institutional guidelines for controlling opinion polling and strong scrutiny of election surveys. This would not only instill transparency in the opinion polling industry in India but also restore public confidence on election surveys. As a result of these controversies, the ECI prohibited the publication and dissemination of results of opinion polls and exit polls in the General Elections 1998. The prohibition was for showing election survey findings during the election till the voting process was completely over. The ban imposed by the ECI in 1998 was challenged in the Supreme Court of India by a petition filed by Frontline magazine. The highest court in India declined to pass an interim order and a three-division bench comprising Justice M.M. Punchhi, Justice B.N. Kirpal, and Justice M. Srinivasan observed, “If we grant a stay, we will be allowing the petitions and similarly if we deny the stay, we will be dismissing them. We are doing neither and simply adjourning the matter. The Press might take risks.” Thus the ban imposed could not be strictly imposed by ECI in General elections 1998. However, the petition seeking a ban on election surveys case was finally decided by the Supreme Court of

156

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

India which said, “The Election Commission of India is free to frame its guidelines to regulate publication of exit polls.” Based on the judgment of the Supreme Court of India, ECI issued an order and directions for curbing the scope of election surveys by banning the publication of election survey during the elections. The ECI laid down clearly that No result of any opinion or exit poll conducted shall be published, publicized or disseminated in any manner by print, electronic or any other media at any time during the period of 48 hours ending with the hour fixed for closing of poll in an election held in a single phase.

This order was also applicable to all the states and territories in which the elections were to be held in different phases. The ECI also laid down directions that organizations and agencies conducting opinion or exit polls must indicate the sample size of the electorate covered by such polls and the geographical spread of the survey. The polls should give details about the methodology followed, the percentage of errors, the professional background, and the experience of the organization and key professionals involved in the conduct and analysis of the polls. The Press Council of India has also reiterated the directions given by ECI by laying down guidelines for conducting “pre-poll and exit poll” surveys. The guidelines caution that newspapers and magazines should neither allow the media to be used for distortions and manipulations of the elections nor allow themselves to be exploited by interested parties. The Council suggests that whenever the newspapers publish pre-poll surveys, care should be taken to preface them conspicuously by indicating the name of the institutions that have carried such surveys, the individuals and organizations which have commissioned the surveys, the size and nature of sample selected, the method of selection of the sample for the findings, and the possible margin of error in the findings. Further in the event of staggered poll dates, media should not carry exit poll surveys of the phases of polls already held. This is likely to influence the voters where the polling is yet



Limitations and Emerging Challenges

157

to commence. With a view to ensure that the electoral process is kept pure and the voters’ minds are not influenced by any external factors, it is necessary that the media does not publish the exit poll surveys till the last poll is held. Thus the present legal status of conducting election surveys is that there is no ban in conducting election surveys in India during the election period but the findings of the polls cannot be published by the media till the last vote is cast. The opinions of psephologists and political analysts on the ban of opinion polls and exit polls in 1998 by the ECU were varied. Yogendra Yadav agreed with the ban on publication of results of exit poll on the day of polling and said “Publication of exit poll results should be banned till the last person has cast his vote. There should be some sanctity of the vote.” However, he did not agree with the order banning publication and dissemination of results of opinion polls before the polling day as it would deprive the voter access to balanced and correct information (the Tribune, August 28, 1999). Similarly, GVL Narasimha Rao also did not have any objection to the EC directive banning the publication of opinion poll results. He, however, opposed a blanket ban as an opinion poll is another means of disseminating information about what people think about political parties and the issues they think are important. He said, “Opinion polls are similar to what is written in newspapers, magazines and discussed in television. If opinion can be expressed about the outcome of the elections in these media then opinion and exit polls should also enjoy the same rights” (the Tribune, August 28, 1999). Thus most of the psephologists and political analysts agreed with the ban on showing exit polls on electronic media on the day of voting till the voting process was over. But they were skeptical about the ban of showing election survey findings before the polling day as it deprived the voters to right to information. The ban by the ECI of not showing or publicizing any result of opinion or exit poll at any time during the period of 48 hours ending with the hour fixed for closing of poll in an election raises a connected and vital question. Do the findings of

158

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

election surveys have a direct impact on the electorates and do they influence their voting intentions? Is the impact of election surveys so strong that it changes the original voting intentions of the voters? Research studies conducted in the Western countries have shown that the finding of election surveys does influence the voting intentions of the electorates and sometimes creates either a bandwagon or an underdog effect. Bandwagon effect occurs when voters start supporting the projected winner and vote in their favor. On the other hand, an underdog effect results in voters sympathizing with the projected loser and voting in their favor. But the question remains whether the findings of election survey in India also create such bandwagon or underdog effect during the elections. GVL Narasimha Rao of the Development and Research Services (DRS) was of the view that opinion poll results cannot alter the party leanings that the electorate acquires over a long period of time but they do influence “undecided” voters and it does have an effect on the morale of the party cadre. The “undecided voter” influenced by the opinion poll may resort to tactical voting thereby increasing or decreasing the margin of defeat (the Tribune, August 28, 1999). Though there has not been any comprehensive research done to gauge the bandwagon or underdog effect on Indian elections, still CSDS tried to find its effect and impact in one of its election surveys. An all-India election survey conducted by CSDS during the General elections held in 1996 had questions to find out the awareness of survey findings and the impact of seat prediction among the voters.The survey finding showed that an overwhelming majority of ordinary voters had not read or heard about opinion poll-based election forecasts made by CSDS in an earlier survey. The assessment based on the 1996 CSDS survey findings show that only 0.7 percent of the voters were influenced in their voting decisions by the opinion poll forecast made by CSDS. This finding provides some evidence that an opinion poll forecast does not have any significant and substantial impact on the voting decision of the Indian electorate. Yogendra Yadav said that the “Bandwagon”



Limitations and Emerging Challenges

159

and “Underdog” effect are terms that have come from the west and in assessing the effect of the opinion polls, there is no sufficient evidence in this country to prove such hypotheses (the Tribune, August 28, 1999). This clearly points that the findings of the election surveys cannot be used to influence the voters in India in a big way. Thus ECI should need to think and probe deeper into this aspect and review its decision to ban the dissemination of election surveys before the polling day.

References Ahmad, Imtiaz. 1977. “Election Studies in India,” Economic and Political Weekly, September 24, XII(39): 1677–80. Athreya. 1998. “Are Opinion Polls Relevant? A Review of the Major Preelection Opinion Polls,” Frontline, Vol. 15(5): 7–20. Bartels, L.M. 1988. Presidential Primaries and the Dynamics of Public Choice. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Benney, M., A. Gray, and R. Pear. 1956. How People Vote. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul. Berelson, B., P.F. Lazarsfeld, and W.V. McPhee. 1954. Voting: A Study of Opinion Formation in a Presidential Campaign. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Blair, H.W. 1979. Voting, Caste, Community, Society: Explorations in Aggregate Data Analysis in India and Bangladesh. Delhi: Young Asia Publication. Blais, A. and L. Massicotte. 1996. “Electoral Systems,” in L. LeDuc, R.G. Niemi, and P. Norris (eds), Comparing Democracies: Elections and Voting in Global Perspective, pp. 49–81. Thousand Oaks: SAGE Publications. Budge, I., D. Robertson, and D. Hearl (eds). 1987. Ideology, Strategy and Party Change: Spatial Analyses of Post-war Election Programmes in 19 Democracies. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Butler, D.E. 1952. The British General Election of 1951. London: Macmillan. Butler, D.E. and D.E. Stokes. 1974. Political Change in Britain: The Evolution of Electoral Choice (2nd ed.). London: Macmillan. Butler, David, Ashok Lahiri, and Prannoy Roy. 1995. India Decides: Elections 1952–1995. Delhi: Books & Things. Campbell, A., P.E. Converse, W.E. Miller, and D.E. Stokes. 1960. The American Voter. New York: Wiley. ———. 1966. Elections and the Political Order. New York: Wiley. Campbell, D.T. 1950. “The Indirect Assessment of Social Attitudes,” Psychological Bulletin, 47(1): 15–38.



References

161

Clark, T.N. and S.M. Lipset. 1991. “Are Social Classes Dying?” International Sociology, 6(4): 397–410. Comparative Study of Electoral Systems. 1996. Available at http://www. umich.edu:80/~nes/cses/cses.htm. Cook, S.W. and C.A. Selltiz. 1964. “Multiple-indicator Approach to Attitude Measurement,” Psychological Bulletin, 62(1): 36–55. Crewe, I. 1984. “The Electorate: Partisan Dealignment Ten Years on,” in H. Berrington (ed.), Change in British Politics, pp. 183–215. London: Frank Cass. Crewe, I., B. Särlvik, and J. Alt. 1977. “Partisan Dealignment in Britain 1964–1974,” British Journal of Political Science, 7(2): 129–90. Curtice, John. 2000. “The Future of Election Studies: Mid-Life Crisis or New Youth?” Working Paper Number 78. Available at http://www.crest. ox.ac.uk. Curtice, J. and H. Semetko. 1994. “Does it Matter what the Papers say?” in A. Heath, R. Jowell, J. Curtice, and B. Taylor (eds), Labour’s Last Chance? The 1992 Election and Beyond, pp. 43–63. Aldershot: Dartmouth. Dalton, R.J. 1996. Citizen Politics: Public Opinion and Political Parties in Advanced Western Democracies. Chatham, NJ: Chatham House. Dalton, R., S. Flanagan, and P. Beck (eds). 1984. Electoral Change in Advanced Industrial Democracies. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Downs, A. 1957. An Economic Theory of Democracy. New York: Harper & Row. Edwards, A.L. 1957. Techniques of Attitude Scale Construction. New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts. Eldersveld, S.J. 1951. “Theory and Method in Voting Behavior Research,” The Journal of Politics, 13(1): 70–87. Eldersveld, Samuel and Bashiruddin Ahmed. 1978. Citizens and Politics: Mass Political Behaviour in India. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Evans, G. (ed.). 1999. The End of Class Politics? Oxford: Oxford University Press. Evans, G., A.F. Heath, and C.D. Payne. 1999. “Class: Labour as a Catchall Party?” in G. Evans and P. Norris (eds), Critical Elections: British Parties and Voters in Long-term Perspective, pp. 87–101. London: SAGE Publications. Franklin, M., T. Mackie, and H. Valen (eds). 1992. Electoral Change: Responses to Evolving Social and Attitudinal Structures in Western Countries. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Ghose, Sagarika. 1996. “Psephology, Surveying the Masses, Politicians Redefine Grassroots Contact as they Resort to Opinion Polls to Read the Voter’s Mind,” Outlook, February.

162

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

Gill, G.S. 2008. “Election Result Forecasting Using Two Layer Perceptron Network,” Journal of Theoretical and Applied Information Technology, 4(11): 1019. Granberg, D. and S. Holmberg. 1988. The Political System Matters: Social Psychology and Voting Behaviour in Sweden and the United States. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Hess, E.H. and J.M. Polt. 1960. “Pupil Size as Related to Interest Value of Visual Stimuli,” Science, 132: 349–50. Available at http://psycnet.apa. org/psycinfo/1961-01581-001. Himmelweit, H.T., M. Jarger, and J. Stockdale. 1978. “Memory for Past Vote: Implications of a Study of Bias in Recall,” British Journal of Political Science, 8(4): 365–76. Huckfeldt, R. Robert and John Sprague. 1993. “Citizens, Contexts and Politics,” in Ada W. Finifter (ed.), Political Science: The State of the Discipline II, pp. 281–303. Washington, DC: American Political Science Association. Johnson, Martin et al. 1999. “Contextual Data and the Study of Elections and Voting Behavior: Connecting Individuals to Environments.” Available at http://www.indiana.edu/~workshop/papers/stein.pdf. Johnston, R., A. Blais, H.E. Brady, and J. Crête. 1992. Letting the People Decide: Dynamics of a Canadian Election. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. Johnston, R. and H. Brady. 2002. “The Rolling Cross-section Design,” Electoral Studies, 21: 283–95. Katz, R. and W. Bernhard, (eds). 1999. European Parliament and European Integration. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Key, V.O. 1966. The Responsible Electorate: Rationality in Presidential Voting 1936–64. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Kiesler, C.A., B.E. Collins, and N. Miller. 1969. Attitude Change: A Critical Analysis of Theoretical Approaches. New York: John Wiley & Sons. Kitschelt, H. 1994. The Transformation of European Social Democracy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Klingemann, H.-D., R. Hofferbert, and I. Budge. 1994. Parties, Policies and Democracy. Boulder, CO: Westview Press. Kondo, Norio. 2007. “Election Studies in India.” Institute of Developing Economies. Discussion Paper no. 98. Kothari, Rajni. 2002. Memoirs: Uneasy is the Life of the Mind. Delhi: Rupa & Co. Lazarsfeld, P.F., B. Berelson, and H. Gaudet. 1948. The People’s Choice: How the Voter Makes Up His Mind in a Presidential Campaign. New York: Columbia University Press.



References

163

Leiderman, P.H. and D. Shapiro (eds). 1964. Physiological Approaches to Social Behavior. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. Lokniti Team. 2004. “National Election Study 2004: An Introduction,” Economic and Political Weekly, December 18, XXXIX(51): 5373–81. Maheshwari, S. 1982. Electoral Politics in the National Metropolis. Delhi: Ritu Publishers. McAllister, I. 1996. “Leaders,” in L. LeDuc, R.G. Niemi, and P. Norris (eds), Comparing Democracies: Elections and Voting in Global Perspective, pp. 180–98. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications. Miller, W.E. 1976. “The Cross-national Use of Party Identification as a Stimulus to Political Enquiry,” in I. Budge, I. Crewe, and D. Farlie (eds), Party Identification and Beyond: Representations of Voting and Party Competition. London: Wiley. Miller, W.E. and J.M. Shanks. 1996. The New American Voter. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Milne, R. and H. Mackenzie. 1954. Marginal Seat 1955. London: Hansard Society. ———. 1954. Straight Fight 1955. London: Hansard Society. Mochmann, E., I.C. Oedegard, and R. Mauer. 1998. Inventory of National Election Studies in Europe 1945–1995. Bergisch Gladbach: Edwin Ferger Verlag. Morris, R. 1995. “What Informed Public?” Washington Post National Weekly Edition, April: 10–16. Narain, Iqbal. 1978. Election Studies in India: An Evaluation. Bombay: Allied Publishers. Narain, Iqbal, K.C. Pande, M.L. Sharma, and Hansa Rajpal. 1978. Election Studies in India: An Evaluation. New Delhi: Allied Publishers. Nieuwbeerta, P. 1995. The Democratic Class Struggle in Twenty Countries. Amsterdam: Thesis Publishers. Norris, P., J. Curtice, D. Sanders, M. Scammell, and H. Semetko. 1999. On Message: Communicating the Campaign. London: SAGE Publications. Osgood, C.E., G.J. Suci, and P.H. Tannenbaum. 1957. The Measurement of Meaning. Urbana: University of Illinois Press. Pareek, U. and T.V. Rao. 1974. Handbook of Psychological and Social Instruments. Baroda: Samashti. Plott, Charles R. 1978. “Rawls’ Theory of Justice: An Impossibility Result,” in Hans W. Gottinger and Werner Leinfeller (eds), Decision Theory and Social Ethics, Issues in Social Choice, pp. 201–14. Dordrecht, Holland: Reindel. Rao, Bhaskara. 2009. A Handbook of Poll Surveys in Media: An Indian Perspective. Delhi: Gyan Publications.

164

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

Roy, Ramashray and Paul Wallace. 1999. Indian Politics and the 1998 Election: Regionalism, Hindutva and State Politics. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications. Salant, P. and Dillman, D.A. 1994. How to Conduct Your Own Survey, pp. 42–43. New York: Wiley. Samuel J. Eldersveld. 1951. “Theory and Method in Voting Behavior Research,” The Journal of Politics, 13(1): 70–87. Cambridge University Press on behalf of the Southern Political Science Association. Schmitt, H. and J. Thomassen (eds). 1999. Political Representation and Legitimacy in the European Union. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Schumpeter, J.A. 1976. Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy, 5th ed. London: Allen and Unwin. Scott, W.A. 1975. “Attitude Measurement,” in G. Lindzey and E. Aronson (eds), Handbook of Social Psychology, rev. ed., Vol. II. New Delhi: Amerind Publishing Co. Pvt. Ltd. Selltiz, C., M. Jahoda, M. Deutsch, and S.W. Cook. 1959. Research Methods in Social Relations. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston. Shah, A.M. 2007. “Introduction,” in A.M. Shah (ed.), The Grassroots of Democracy: Field Studies of Indian Elections, pp. 1–27. Delhi: Permanent Black. Sprague, John. 1982. “Is there a Micro-theory Consistent with Contextual Analysis?” in Elinor Ostrom (ed.), The Nature of Political Inquiry Beverley Hills, CA: SAGE Publications. Srinivas, M.N. and A.M. Shah, 2007. The Grassroots of Democracy: Field Studies of Indian Elections. Delhi: Permanent Black. Thomassen, J. 1976. “Party Identification as a Cross-national Concept: Its Meaning in the Netherlands,” in I. Budge, I. Crewe, and D. Farlie (eds), Party Identification and Beyond: Representations of Voting and Party Competition, pp. 63–79. London: Wiley. ———. 1994. “Introduction: The Intellectual History of Election Studies,” European Journal of Political Research, 25(3): 239–345. Thurstone, L.L. and E.J. Chave. 1929. The Measurement of Attitude. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. Wattenberg, M. 1996. The Decline of American Political Parties 1952–1994. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Weakliem, D. and A. Heath. 1999. “The Secret Life of Class Voting: Britain, France, and the United States since the 1930s,” in G. Evans (ed.), The End of Class Politics, pp. 97–136. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Webb, E.J., D.T. Campbell, R.D. Schwartz, and L. Sechrest. 1966. Unobtrusive Measures: Non-reactive Research in the Social Sciences. Chicago: Rand McNally & Company.



References

165

Weiner, M. and J.O. Field. 1977. “India’s Urban Constituencies,” in M. Weiner and J.O. Field (eds), Electoral Politics in the Indian States, 4 vols. New Delhi: Manohar. Westie, F.R. and M.L. DeFleur. 1959. “Autonomic Responses and their Relationship to Race Attitudes,” Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 58(3): 340–47. Yadav, Yogendra. 2007. “Invitation to a Dialogue: What Work does ‘Fieldwork’ do in the Field of Elections?” in A.M. Shah (ed.), The Grassroots of Democracy: Field Studies of Indian Elections, pp. 345–68. Delhi: Permanent Black. ———. 2008. “Whither Survey Research? Reflections on the State of Survey Research on Politics in Most of the World.” Malcolm Adiseshiah Memorial Lecture, Chennai. Young, P.V. 1960. Scientific Social Surveys and Research. Bombay: Asia Publishing House. Zimbardo, P. and E.B. Ebbesen. 1970. Influencing Attitudes and Changing Behavior. MA: Addison Wesley.

Index accurate measurement, essentiality of, 4 AC Nielsen, research agency, 26 acquiescence bias, 85 aggregate data analysis, 20. See also, Ecological Analysis aggregate statistical approach, 7 Ahmad, Imtiaz, 147–48 Ahmed, Bashiruddin, 19 Akali Dal, 139–40 American Institute of Public Opinion, USA, 147 first prediction by Dr Gallup on Franklin Roosevelt, 16 objective of, 15–16 APT Research Group, 135 artificial neural network model, 137 attitudes of voters, 4. See also, Voting behavior measurement of, 5 by political science, 7 voting intentions, analysis of, 6 Badal, Manpreet, 139 Banerjee, Mukulika, 31–32 Bhargava, Rajeev, xix bipolar contest, between political parties, 138–39 BJP, 11, 26, 139–40, 153–54

Blair, Harry W., 20–21 blanket ban, on election-related opinion by ECI, x, 143–44, 155–59 Bora, Banasmita, xix Bose, Subhash Chandra, 86 Brass, Paul, 31 BSP, 149, 151, 153 Carter, Jimmy, 49 Centre for Media Studies, 26–27 Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS), xiii, xvi, xviii, xix, 11–12, 21–22, 47 Chandran, Ashok, xix Chunaav, 79 close-ended questions, 92–93 cluster sampling technique, 60–61 coalition politics, xvi, xviii cognitive interviewing method, 95 Comparative Electoral Ethnography project, 32 Congress party, 11, 18–19, 139 conducted all-India survey in 1996, 26 end of dominance in 1990s, 143, 149 convenience sampling technique, 61



Index

cross-sectional survey, of voters, 23, 34–35 “Cube Law,” 135–36 C Voter, 26 da Costa, Eric, 16–17, 134 data collection, xvii, 98 practices for convincing respondent and informed consent, 113–14 establishment of purpose and credibility of survey, 112–13 familiarization with questionnaire and location, 111–12 gently probing of interviews, 116–17 reading out of questions in same wording and sequence, 115–16 spot interviews and time for completion, 114–15 data processing method, 126 Deshmukh, Yashwant, 141 Development and Research Services (DRS), 26, 158 Dillman, D.A., 67, 78, 88, 92–93 “double-barreled” question, 81 drop-off election surveys, 42 dummy ballot box, 52 dummy ballot paper, 52, 108–9 Ecological Analysis, 20 ecological analysis. See also, Aggregate data analysis ecological statistical approach, 7 Economist, 29 Eldersveld, S.J., 6–7, 19 election analysts, 14

167

Election Commission of India (ECI), 10–11, 143–44, 155, 159 election day polling, 48–49. See also, Exit polls election polls, growth of, 24–31 election studies focus of political science enquiry in, 7 historical overview of, 31 measurement of voting behavior, 4 purpose of, 8–9 revival in mid-1990s, 28 types in India, 46–53 voting preference of people, 153 election surveys, ix, xiii, xv, 1, 130 ECI blanket ban on findings during election period and impact on voters, 143–44, 155–59 expansion, reasons for, 25 historical overview of, xvi origin of, 15–24 (See also, American Institute of Public Opinion, USA) Poona Lok Sabha constituency study in 1967, xvi sampling methods used in, 69–74 scale usage in, 5 training in (see Training, in elections surveys) election verdict, 9, 129 electoral ethnographic studies, 31–33 electoral politics, xv, 19, 28, 127, 143, 148, 151, 154 Electoral Politics in the National Metropolis (Maheshwari), 20

168

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

electoral rules, governance of, 8 electorates, 150–51 elections surveys to know voting intentions of, 1 Indian characteristics of, 142 Muslims electorates voting behavior, 150 measurement of voting behavior of, 19, 30 (See also, Post-poll survey method; Pre-poll survey method) questionnaire for, stages of, 93–97 study voting behavior of methods to, 4 sociological approach to, 7 electronic media, xvi exit polls, 48. See also, Election day polling in India advantages of, 51–52 methods used, 50–51 Lokniti program, 28 MARG collaboration in 1989 with, 25 in USA, 51 methods adopted, 49–50 study in, ix, xvi–xvii, 35 (See also, Post-poll survey) face-to-face interview, of voters, 98, 111 advantages of, 38 criteria for voters selection, 37 in their residences, 130–31 trained field investigators, investigation by, 37 field interviews difficulties in conducting, in India, 118–24 practices for, 110–18

field investigators (FIs)/ enumerators, 98 mock interviews and field trails by, 109–10 motivation and orientation of, 103–4 training of, 100–101 objectives of, 101 Field, John Osgood, 23–24 field trials, by enumerators, 109–10 fieldwork training, 98 components of administration of questionnaire and handbook using, 107–8 dummy ballot paper and show cards, use of, 108–9 interviewing and communication technique, 104–6 mock interviews and field trials by enumerators, 109–10 motivation and orientation of field enumerators, 103–4 first generation of NES surveys (1967), 28 first-past-the-post (FTPT) electoral system, xvi, xviii, 140 first world, election polls in, 42–45 focus group discussion (FGD), 94–95 focus group interviews, 62. See also, Non-probability sampling forced choice questions, 85 Ford, Gerald, 16 forecasting of elections, 133–37



Index

challenges in, 137–41 Frontline magazine, 29, 135, 155 “Gallup Polls,” 16 Gandhi, Indira, 86 Gandhi, Mahtma, 86–87 Gandhi, Rahul, 81 Gandhi, Sonia, 81 Gill, G.S., 137 Hindu, 29 Index of Opposition Unity (IOU) model, 135 Indian Council of Social Science Research, 20 Indian Institute of Public Opinion (IIPO), 16–17, 22, 134. See also, American Institute of Public Opinion, USA India Today, 26, 29 individual behavior, 6 Indo-US nuclear deal (2007), snap polls usage during parliamentary discussion on, 43 informed consent, 113–14 Institute of Instrumentation Engineering, 137 institutional context approach, 7–8 inter-election panel design, 10 interview schedule. See Questionnaires Jan Sangh, 19 Kambhampati, Sunita, xix Karandikar, Rajeeva, 136

169

Kirpal, B.N., 155 Kogekar, S.V., 17–18 Kumar, Sanjay, xix–xx Kurukshetra University, Haryana, 137 Landon, Alfred, 16 Left Front, 14 Likert scale, 5 Lokniti (Program for Comparative Democracy), xix, 11, 28 Lok Sabha elections of 1998, xix designing of all-India survey for 1980 Lok Sabha elections by CSDS, 22 Lorenz Curve, 21 love–hate relationship of media, for opinion polls, x Mahajan, Pramod, 27 Maheshwari, Shriram, 20 mail, interview of voters through, 39–40 Mandal Commission, 151 margin of error, 132 Marketing and Research Group (MARG), 25 market surveys, 27 measurement, definition of, 3 media houses, x media opinion polls, 69–70, 74 mid-campaign surveys, 53 MIT Center for International Studies, 23 MIT Indian Election Data Project, 23 Mitra, Subrat, 31 mock interviews, by field enumerators, 109–10

170

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

Monthly Public Opinion Studies (MPOS) journal, 16 motivation, of field enumerators, 103–4 Mukherjee, Sohini, xix Narain, Iqbal, 18 National Election Study (NES), xiii–xiv, xix, 11–12, 21–23 in 2009 by CSDS, 30, 102 generations of, 28 NDA, 13–14, 150 Nehru, Jawahar Lal, 86–87 non-probability sampling types of convenience sampling technique (see Convenience sampling technique) quota sampling technique (see Quota sampling technique) snowball sampling technique (see snowball sampling technique) used for focus group interviews, 62 “numbers game,” 32 online election surveys, 42 open-ended questions advantages of, 90–91 disadvantages of, 91–92 opinion polls, ix, xvi–xviii, 1, 126, 147. See also, Roy, Prannoy DRS views on, 158 love–hate relationship of media, x politicians views on, x popularity in 1980s, 24–25

types of, 42–45 use by political parties and candidates, 27 ordinal scale, 5 orientation, of field enumerators, 103–4 Palshikar, Suhas, xix Park, Richard, 17–18 participating pre-test method, 97 Patel, Sardar, 86 People’s Party of Punjab (PPP), 139–40 political behavior, of voters, 6–7, 12, 21, 23, 143, 148 political contests, nature of, 138 politicians, Indian, ix suggestion of blanket ban on election-related opinion, by ECI, x politics contextual theories of, 6 politics shares, academic understanding of, xi pollsters, x, xviii, 14, 26 Poona Lok Sabha constituency, Sirsikar’s study in 1967 of, xvi, 18 post, interview of voters through, 39–40 post-poll survey method, xiii, 9–10, 52–53. See also, Exit polls pre-poll survey method, 9–10, 13, 46–48. See also, Forecasting of elections; Seat predictions Press Council of India, 156 pre-testing, of questionnaires, 95–97 primacy effects, 86–87. See also, Recency effects



Index

probabilistic count method, 136 probability proportionate to size (PPS) technique, 22, 29, 62 probability sampling essential requirement for, 58 meaning of, 58 techniques of cluster sampling technique (see Cluster sampling technique) simple random sampling technique (see Simple random sampling technique) systematic random sampling technique (see Systematic random sampling technique) Psephology, definition of, 2, 4 Punchhi, M.M., 155 quantitative attributes, 3–4 questionnaires administration for fieldwork, 107–8 basics of good, parameters of avoidance of short and lengthy questions, 79–81 categorisation of answers must follow question, 82–83 clear time reference, questions with, 81–82 “Do not know” or “No opinion,” option of, 87 double negative questions, avoidance of, 84–85 forced choice questions, preference for, 85 preference should given for specific questions, 83–84

171

recent effects, avoidance of, 86–87 usage of simple and common words, 78–79 writing of two questions, avoidance of, 81 classification and structure of, 88–93 definition of, 75 designing of, methods, 77 evaluation of survey exploration and development (stage I), 94–95 pre-testing (stage II), 95–97 face-to-face interviews, usage for, 76–77 parameters of, 75–76 standard and semi-structured questionnaires, 76 quota sampling technique, 62, 71–74 Rai, Praveen, xix–xx Ramjanambhoomi controversy, 151 Ranjan, Ashish, 102 Rao, GVL Narasimha, 157–58 Rao, N. Bhaskara, 27 rational choice approach, 7–8 Reagan, Ronald, 49 recency effects, 86–87. See also, Primacy effects regular elections, importance of, xv Report on the Indian General Elections, 17 respondent consent, 113–14 right sampling technique, selection of, 63–65 rolling polls method, 45

172

Measuring Voting Behaviour in India

Roosevelt, Franklin, 16 Roy, Prannoy, 24–25, 135, 140 Saansad, 79 Salant, P., 67, 78, 88, 92–93 sampling error, 131–33 sampling survey of electorate, 4–5 methods of election surveys, used in, 69–74 non-probability sampling (see Non-probability sampling) probability sampling (see Probability sampling) selection and distribution of, criteria for, 63–69 scale, use in election studies, 5 seat predictions, 133–37, 139 second generation of NES (1996–1999), 28–29 semi-structured questionnaires, 76 Shah, A.M., 31–32, 154 Sharma, Suresh, xix Shastri, Lal Bahadur, 86 Sheth, D.L., xix show cards, 108–9 simple random sampling technique, 58–59, 64 Singh, Dhanajay Kumar, xix Singh, Manmohan, 66 Singh, V.B., xix Singh, V.P., 86–87 Sirsikar, V.M., 18 snap polls method advantages of, 43 in India, 43 popularity among media, 44 purpose of, 43 snowball sampling technique, 61

sociological/social contextual approach, 6 split vote technique, 19 Srinivasan, M., 155 Srinivas, M.N., 31–32 Srivastava, R.K., xix standard error, 131–32 standard questionnaires, 76 state assembly elections, turnouts in, xv Studies in Electoral Politics in the Indian State (Weiner and Field), 23–24 Supreme Court of India, 155–56 surplus votes, xviii. See also, Wasted votes survey reporting, essential information of sampling error and weightings, in survey, 131–33 sampling method and voters profile, 128–29 survey and other details, purpose of, 129–31 swing of votes, 9, 135–36 systematic random sampling technique, 59–60, 65, 71 telephonic survey, of voters disadvantages of, 41–42 interviews of selected voters, through telephone, 40–41 popularity in first world, 41 strengths of, 41 think-aloud interviewing, 95 third generation of NES (2004), 29 tracking polls method, 44 training in election surveys, 100–103



undecided voter, 157 undeclared pre-test method, 97 UPA, 13–14, 150 US presidential elections, Gallup opinion polls on, 16 verbal probing method, 95 Vidhan Sabha, 21 Vidhayak, 79 voters face-to-face interview of (see Face-to-face interview, of voters) interview through mail/post, 39–40 opinion and attitudes of, 1–2 polarization, impact of, 151 profile of, 128–29 quota sampling of sampling of voters, orders of, 72–74 selection of households, process of, 72 survey through telephone, 40–42 systematic random sampling of, 71 voting behavior, xiv, 2, 34–35. See also, Attitudes challenges in during beginning phase, 144–48

Index

173

second phase, 1990 onwards, 148–54 computation by political science, 7 interviewing techniques for measurement of face-to-face interview of voters, 37–38 interview through mail or by post, 39–40 telephonic survey, 40–42 meaning of, 5–6 measurement of, 1, 5 reasons for, 8–12 sociological approach for, 7 voting intentions, analysis of, 6 Voting, Caste, Community, Society: Explorations in Aggregated Data Analysis in India and Bangladesh (Blair), 20 wasted votes, xviii. See also, Surplus votes weights, 69 Weiner, Myron, 23–24 Western democracies, opinion polls in, x women voters, exclusion in NES 1967, 22 Yadav, Yogendra, xiv, xix, 4, 27, 138, 140–41, 153–54, 157–59

About the Authors Sanjay Kumar is a Fellow at the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS) and Co-Director of Lokniti, a research program of the CSDS. He specializes in election studies and is engaged in collecting scientifically reliable data on political behavior and attitudes of the Indian electorate. His area of research has been electoral politics with a special focus on patterns and strategies of electoral mobilization. His research draws heavily from survey research, which he pursues as his research tool. Trained in survey research at Summer School at University of Michigan, he has been the director of various national and state level surveys conducted by CSDS during Lok Sabha elections of 1996, 1998, 1999, 2004, and 2009. Besides the NES, he has also directed various state level studies. He has co-edited Rise of Plebians? The Changing Face of the Indian Legislative Assemblies (2009) with Christopher Jaffrelot and co-authored Indian Youth in a Transforming World: Attitudes and Perceptions (2009) with Peter R. DeSouza and Sandeep Shastri. He has also authored various research reports, contributed articles for several edited volumes, and published in many international and national research journals. Praveen Rai is an Academic Secretary at Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS), Delhi, a premier institute in social science research and humanities in India, funded by Indian Council of Social Science Research. His key areas of research interests are: election studies with a special focus on states of Haryana and Chhattisgarh, participation of Indian women in electoral politics



About the Authors

175

and media monitoring. Before his present assignment, he worked as a Project Manager at Lokniti, where he handled more than 50 election studies and opinion polls and was actively involved right from the stage of designing the surveys till final dissemination of processed data in the public domain. His writings have been published in Indian academic journals, mostly in the Economic and Political Weekly (EPW). His seminal work, Electoral Participation of Women in India: Key Determinants and Barriers, was published as a special article in the January 2011 issue of EPW. He used content analysis as a research tool to ascertain and analyze the media coverage of women’s issues in mainline newspapers in 2002. Based on this study, he wrote a book called Women in Press—Still Invisible in association with the German foundation, Friedrich Ebert Stiftung (FES), India office in 2003.