Exit polls on Thursday forecast a tight contest between the incumbent Trinamool Congress and the BJP in the high-profile West Bengal assembly polls and put the saffron combine ahead in Assam, while projecting a win for the ruling Left alliance in Kerala and for the DMK-led opposition in Tamil Nadu.
The exit poll numbers were largely a setback for the Congress, which while falling short in Assam and Kerala may also lose its government in the union territory of Puducherry to the opposition alliance of AINRC-BJP-AIADMK.
Exit polls were, however, divided in their forecast for the West Bengal polls, where the BJP ran a high-octane campaign in its bid to capture power in the state for the first time by ending Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee's 10-year old reign.
