Exit poll firm Axis My India is now a case study at Harvard Business School

Axis My India, a market research organization known for its election surveys and exit poll analysis, is now a case study at the Harvard Business School (HBS) and its election forecasting model will be part of a course on elections at the Ivy League school.

“Predicting elections accurately in an extremely complex country like India is difficult. AMI’s track record is a testament to the company’s project management and process excellence capabilities. This case study illustrates operational details, including those associated with training surveyors and moving them across different locations based on their linguistic and socio-economic identities to get a feel of the electorate’s pulse,” said Ananth Raman, a professor at HBS, who has co-authored the case study.

In a complex country such as India, forecasting elections is not easy, but Axis My India has a fair share of success in predicting election outcome through field surveys and exit polls, and its relative success has made it a talking point among academics, media, and research organizations in last few years.

“We are delighted that a globally renowned institution such as Harvard Business School has built a case around our work at Axis My India. We are pioneers in the methodology for election surveys and have predicted ‘most accurately’ the outcomes of 43 out of 47 elections so far,” said Pradeep Gupta, chairman and managing director of AMI, said in a statement.

Gupta said their work demonstrates expertise in offering “insight solutions through field surveys across the length and breadth of our country”.

Almost every year, some part of India witnesses election either to select law makers in state assemblies or for by-polls at the state or national level. Last week, the Election Commission of India has announced the schedule for the assembly elections in Assam, West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Puducherry and the process that begins this week will end mid-May.