THE TROUBLE WITH PREDICTING POLLS IN FOREIGN LANDS

Foreign diplomats in India have often missed the mark in predicting political outcomes here. Indian diplomats have been no less erratic in calling elections in their foreign stations

- K P NAYAR

FOR many ambassadors, deputy chiefs of mission and even political counsellors in Chanakyapuri, the national capital's diplomatic enclave, life changed on June 4. The comfort zone they had become used to during their posting in New Delhi-usually lasting three years disappeared overnight. For most of them, and their rotational predecessors going back to the summer of 2014, India had been a political theatre of certainties. Those certainties vanished overnight as results of the elections to the 18th Lok Sabha came in. Many of them were stunned, pretty much like unsuspecting Indians who watched television on June 1 and fell hook, line and sinker for the exit polls aired that night.

For 10 years, diplomatic missions in New Delhi sent unceasing reports to their headquarters about the rise and rise of Narendra Modi. There was an inevitable predictability about the fundamental premise of their reports: the dominance of the BJP over India's political landscape, with the exception of a few outliers like Kerala and Tamil Nadu.

For a variety of reasons, Kolkata is on the early itinerary of almost every important head of mission who is newly credentialled to Rashtrapati Bhavan. Numerous political counsellors from Chanakyapuri went to West Bengal before the 2019 Lok Sabha elections to prepare for visits by their bosses. They correctly predicted that the BJP would replace the Congress and the Left as the foil for the state's ruling Trinamool Congress.