Larry King of Telugu media, aka Kommineni is “well known” for his surveys. In 2014, he was seen in NTV parroting surveys, which claimed that YSR Congress party, led by Jagan Mohan Reddy, is storming into power with an emphatic majority. It is understandable if survey agencies and news channels get pre poll surveys wrong. But Mr. Kommineni and team failed miserably with exit-poll surveys also.
Here are the results of the post-poll survey published by NTV on 8th May for which Kommineni was the editor on chief.
- YSRCP — 129-133 seats ( 19-21 MP seats)
- TDP — 42- 46 seats ( 4-6 MP seats)
The actual results in 2014 elections are there for everyone to see.
Now, even after getting all the surveys he presided over completely incorrect, Kommineni came up with an “internal survey’ this time. On 08/23, Kommineni published a ‘TDP Internal’ survey, which even the higher sources in TDP are not aware. Kommineni goes on to write that TDP would only get 51 seats and the party is very concerned with this. While it is completely true that there is anti-incumbency on Naidu’s government, this has been a strategy of Kommineni and other tabloid media to write these news in guise of ‘internal surveys’. As expected, a website immediately replicated this news item without doing any fact-checking. “We are not sure of any survey’s that were commissioned by Naidu. I’m not sure where media gets these from” says a MP who is very close to Mr. Naidu.
PS: In all the surveys that Kommineni reported till date, YSRCP is the winner and Jagan most capable CM.
PS2: Kommineni doesn’t have any conflict of interest. He just happens to work for Sakshi TV.
