Indian Pollsters to Set Up Industry Association

A group of agencies in India are planning to set up a self-regulatory industry body, with the aim of improving standards in the way the country's polls are conducted.

In an article in The Hindu newspaper, Yashwant Deshmukh (pictured), MD of polling company CVoter, said the new Indian Polling Council will be made up of six agencies, some of which conduct both market research and electoral polls. Raw data drawn from polls will be shared among members of the group for peer scrutiny, and in addition to his own firm, founding members will include Cicero, Ipsos, Nielsen and non-profit organization CSDS.

Deshmukh told The Hindu: 'The council will create a standard declaration form which will require all participating pollsters to state the methodology, sample size, sampling methodology and demographic details, margin of error, who commissioned the poll and other details. If they choose not to, then the onus is on the media whether they want to use the poll'.