india

Updated: May 20, 2019 17:01 IST

Union finance minister Arun Jaitley has said that Sunday’s exit polls signalled “a huge maturing of Indian democracy” and listed six takeaways in a blog titled The Message of Exit Polls.

Jaitley believes that voters are sending several messages including one that they are no longer willing to trust a ‘coalition of rivals’. “Political analysts are confused but the voters are clear. They don’t elect hung Parliament where ugly and untenable coalitions have a role to play.”

He also said that issues of national interest have now caught the imagination of the people over caste considerations and that voters don’t buy fake issues.

“The personalised campaign against Prime Minister Modi did not cut much ice in 2014 and may not cut any ice in 2019. Leaders are judged on merit and not on caste or family names. Thus, the Prime Minister’s style of rising above caste and concentrating on performance related issues received far more acceptability with the electorate.’

He also reiterated the Congress the first family is no longer an asset but an albatross around neck of the Party. “Without the family, they don’t get the crowd, with it they don’t get the votes.”

“The hard reality is that when multiple Exit Polls convey the same message, the direction of the result broadly would be in consonance with the message.... . If the results of the Exit Polls and final results on the 23rd May, 2019 are in the same direction, the Opposition’s fake issue of the EVMs would also lose its non-existent rationale,” he wrote.