The terrific Indian journal, Seminar, has a special issue focused on the ins and outs of election surveys in India. The essays are gated until September 1, but for now you can read the introductory essay by Rahul Verma (the guest editor) here.

Election surveys have something of a checkered past in India. The essays in this special issue look at the problems, suggest solutions, and examine how surveys work in other democracies. To quote Rahul, the issue tries to address three questions:

First, is polling an imperfect science? Second, what is an ideal time to conduct a poll that proposes to study the political behaviour of citizens? And third, what would be the academic cost of not conducting polls at the time of elections?

Neelanjan Sircar and I have a piece on how to better leverage surveys in India from a research perspective. You can read that one here.