West Bengal Exit Poll 2019 Live: How BJP looks set to get 19-24 seats
BJP president Amit Shah had been working extra hard to take the party’s tally to double digits in the state. If the exit polls hold, his strategy could have paid off.
Lok Sabha elections 2019 have been one of the most bitterly contested elections ever — and the bitterest part of it unfolded in the east Indian state of West Bengal.
Here's what the exit polls say could happen:
With 42 seats at stake, West Bengal saw widespread violence, both verbal and physical, for each seat going to the polls.
So high was the scale of violence in the state that the Election Commission of India (ECI) spread the polls over seven phases.
Watch West Bengal Exit Poll 2019 Live:
The ECI even had to cut short canvassing time by about 24 hours, given the high levels of violence in the state, and following the destruction of iconic Bengali reformer Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar's statue in Kolkata.
The battle has been particularly bitter because the BJP, which is expected to suffer some loss of seats in UP, is looking at West Bengal to make up for the losses in the north Indian state.
BJP president Amit Shah had been working extra hard to take the party’s tally to double digits in the state. If the exit poll results hold, West Bengal could see BJP win between 19 and 23 seats up from two seats in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. TMC, meanwhile, will be down from 34 to between 19 and 22.
There are speculations that West Bengal has seen a lot of silent voting, given that people in the state are apparently scared of openly voting against the Mamata Banerjee-led Trinamool Congress (TMC) fearing violence.