Exit Poll: BJP likely to retain power in UP, AAP may scoop Punjab

The Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP) is all set to retain power in Uttar Pradesh - one of the most politically crucial states - while the Aam Aadmi Party will scoop Punjab, the poll of exit polls predicted, as the curtains came down on voting for state elections yesterday. 

Five states - Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Goa, Punjab and Manipur - voted in phases, spanning nearly a month - to elect MLAs to the state Assemblies.

Yogi Adityanath-led BJP is likely to win a second term in the state by a landslide, five exit polls showed. The sum of exit polls by India Today-Axis My India, C-Voter, Today's Chanakya, Jan ki Baat and Veto pointed to 260 seats for the BJP and its allies. The contest was for 403 seats - the majority mark being 202. The Samajwadi Party is projected to come in second with 126 seats. Congress' massive push



for women empowerment, tamped by its slogan "ladki hoon lad sakti hoon (I am a woman and I can fight)", failed to give the party the boost it had hoped for. It has been pegged to win four seats.

The poll of exit polls has predicted a neck-and-neck fight in the coastal state of Goa, where the BJP and the Congress have been predicted to win 17 seats each by India Today-Axis My India, C-Voter, and Jan ki Baat. In the state with 40 Assembly seats and 21 as the majority mark, the smaller regional parties will most likely play kingmaker. C-Voter is the only pollster that has calculated the seats for Mamata Banerjee's Trinamool Congress and predicted just seven seats for it - much less than what it had hoped to achieve. However, it could end up playing the role of the major powerbroker in the state.