'Will shave my head' if BJP wins again, vows AAP's Somnath Bharti

Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader Somnath Bharti has vowed to shave his head if Narendra Modi retained the prime minister's post while his party's national convener and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal asserted that the INDIA bloc would form a "strong and stable" government at the Center.

Exit polls on June 1 predicted that Modi will retain power for a third straight term, with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led National Democratic Alliiance (NDA) expected to win a big majority in the Lok Sabha polls.

In a post on X, Bharti who is the AAP candidate from the New Delhi Lok Sabha constituency, said all exit polls will be proven wrong on June 4 when results are announced.

"I will shave off my head if Mr Modi becomes PM for the third time. Mark my word! All exit polls will be proven wrong on 4th June and Modi ji will not become prime minister for the third time," Bharti said.

"In Delhi, all seven seats will go to India ALLIANCE. Fear of Mr Modi does not allow exit polls to show him loose (lose). Hence we all need to wait for actual results scheduled to be delivered on June 4th. People have voted very heavily against BJP," he said.

Following a meeting of the INDIA bloc leaders at Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge's residence, Kejriwal said according to the feedback received from the people, the opposition alliance is going to win more than 295 seats in the Lok Sabha polls.

"INDIA bloc is headed towards forming a strong and stable government," he asserted.

The BJP will win 220 seats on its own while the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) will end up getting 235 seats, he claimed.

Most exit polls for Delhi predicted the BJP to win five to seven Lok Sabha seats. The city has seven Lok Sabha constituencies held by the BJP since 2014.

While TV9 Bharatvarsha-Polstrat predicted a clean sweep for BJP, India TV-CNX and Axis My India - India Today suggested BJP winning six to seven seats, giving Congress' JP Agarwal an edge over BJP candidate Praveen Khandelwal in Chandni Chowk.

The AAP and Congress, INDIA bloc constituents, have contested four and three Lok Sabha seats in Delhi.

Meanwhile, Delhi BJP president Virendra Sachdeva exuded confidence that the exit polls predicting BJP winning all seven seats in Delhi will hold true on June 4 – when the results will be declared.

However, AAP Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Singh rejected the exit polls, saying they were "sponsored" and called them "Modi's exit poll."

He said during the INDIA bloc meeting, a state-wise discussion based on feedback from different party leaders suggested that the alliance would secure 295 seats.

Singh said the INDIA bloc would form the government at the Center, arguing that exit polls with a sample size of 20 to 25,000 in a country with a population of 144 crore do not make any significant difference.

(PTI)