Revision as of 23:42, 4 September 2017

Campaigning issues

Litter: posters, ugly campaign graffiti

Manash Gohain, September 4, 2017: The Times of India

Rules regarding the use of paper during elections, Delhi University Students' Union, 2006-16; Manash Gohain, September 4, 2017: The Times of India

Rules for elections in Delhi University Students' Union, 2014-17; Manash Gohain, September 4, 2017: The Times of India

Condition of roads during elections of Delhi University Students' Union, 2013; Manash Gohain, September 4, 2017: The Times of India

Condition of roads during election of Delhi University Students' Union, 2014; Manash Gohain, September 4, 2017: The Times of India

During the times of election, every available space on the campus is taken up by posters and ugly campaign graffiti. Both the JM Lyngdoh Commission on student politics, in 2006, and the National Green Tribunal, since 2015, have urged the university to opt for paperless electioneering.But 10 days before polling day , one easily sees that the DUSU poll is not only among the biggest in student union balloting, but also among the ugliest.

The problem is that despite the restrictions placed by the Lyngdoh panel and NGT, neither the election committee nor the university administration goes beyond the “ritualistic“ threat of action against violators. This is starkly clear from the pictures TOIhas pulled out from its archives that show the huge volume of paper -printed posters, pamphlets, mailers -used in campaigning from 2011 to 2016, not only on the campus but across the city .

And while the DUSU election panel gave the contending parties a 36-hour ultimatum on August 30 to clean the walls defaced in the campaign, printed paper continues to blight the walls around the university .

There is a backlash of sorts, with students, particularly from Ram Lal Anand and Kirori Mal colleges, declaring they would not to vote for any student organisation that littered their campuses. At Miranda House, too, students chanted, “No paper wastage, no pizzas, no Lakme kajal. If the roads are mucked up by your posters, we will not vote for you.“

Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad, while assuring a check on paper usage, however, maintained that paperless canvassing was not possible.Saket Bahuguna, national media coordinator, ABVP , said: “We had suggested creating a wall of democracy where posters could be legally pasted, but this did not happen. We have to approach 1.4 lakh students and have an impractical limit of Rs 5,000 as electoral expense per candidate. Under these conditions, posters and pamphlets are the only option.“

Advising the election committee to call an all-party meeting on the matter, given that the Congress-affiliated National Students' Union of India and other student organisations were also against the massive wastage of paper, Bahuguna added, “In future, there has to be some form of digital intervention.“

NSUI itself blames ABVP for plastering the city with posters for its candidates and pleads that since people vote for names that have recall and recognition, there is little the others can do differently . Ruchi Gupta, national spokesperson, NSUI, claimed, “We haven't carried out postering in institutions because we have a very active social media team.“

Gupta talked of a level-playing field for all contestants so as not to handicap some, alleging that ABVP candidates put up posters long before the election schedule was notified. “The rules of the game has to be equally applied and the DU administration should have come down heavily on ABVP .“

Election results

2012-14

2012-14, Votes polled and victorious parties. 2014, Highlights; Graphic courtesy: 2012-14: Votes polled and victorious parties. 2014: Highlights; Graphic courtesy: The Times of India

See graphic, '2012-14, Votes polled and victorious...'

2014,15, 16: trends

2015: DUSU election results; ABVP sweeps polls for second year in a row; Graphic courtesy: The Times of India

See graphic, '2015: DUSU election results...'

The Times of India, September 11, 2016

Manash Gohain

Saffron tide in DU, but red fort intact in JNU

NSUI dented ABVP's victory record in the Delhi University Students' Union polls, making a comeback after two years and winning one of the four central seats. Candidates of BJP-affiliated ABVP , which had recorded back-to-back clean sweeps in 2014 and 2015, won the posts of president, vicepresident and secretary , but yielded the joint secretary's post to the students' wing of the Congress.

Suitably enough, unlike on the previous occasions or even when it had won just the president's post in 2008, ABVP this time celebrated its triumph in a subdued manner. The gulaal and crackers were missing and the victory march at the Vivekananda Statue at the Arts Faculty was not as boisterous as before.

ABVP not only failed to sustain the momentum of 2014 and 2015, but even its winning margins and the vote share dipped. Amit Tanwar won the post of DUSU president by a margin of 4,664 votes. In 2015, ABVP had recorded a vote share of 35.9% which slid to 34.5% this year. While Tanwar's margin was the biggest for the outfit, its lowest had been a similar 4,610 last year.

NSUI, whose Mohit Garid is the new joint secretary , claimed that the “massive increase“ in the vote share for his organisation spelt the end of ABVP in DU. “We are now confident of winning all four posts in 2017,“ said Garid. However, there was no such vote swing in its favour, and it recorded a 24.7% vote share, almost unchanged from 24.8% in 2015.

While Tanwar said that the vote “is a comment against the anti-national activities across the country“, an allusion to the February 9 incident in JNU, the leftist student organisation, AISA, actually improved its vote count on every ballot. “Taking its jingoistic rhe toric to a high with its `9 ka badla 9 ko lenge' slogan, ABVP boasted it would wipe out AISA from DU and defeat it in the JNU students' union elections, but both the claims have fallen flat,“ said Aman Nawaz, secretary , AISA, DU unit.

Some students said that the dip in ABVP's vote share was due to it deviating from campus issues and bringing the “anti-national“ issue to the election table. But Ankit Singh Sangwan, the new DUSU secretary , was undeterred and said at the victory march: “Nationalism has been our main issue throughout the elections and we will work at instilling nationalism in the students.“

Meanwhile, the only female candidate to win the polls, Priyanka, who as ABVP candidate won the post of DUSU vice-president, opined that the low turnout on polling day had helped NSUI. “The turnout was poor because several firstyear and second-year students weren't issued ID cards in time,“ she alleged. “Also several colleges didn't hold elections, so fewer students turned up to vote. Otherwise we would have swept the polls again.“

However, putting behind the politicking, she said, “We will now work closely with all students, especially the girl students. We will set up special cells for them and also launch a safety app for them.“

2016 elections: ABVP wins 3, NSUI 1

The Times of India, Sep 10, 2016

Manash Pratim Gohain

DUSU poll: ABVP wins 3 seats, NSUI 1

BJP's student wing Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) bagged three of the four seats in the Delhi University Students' Union (DUSU) elections.

ABVP won the post of president, vice president and secretary. The post of joint secretary went to Congress's National Students Union of India (NSUI).

Amit Tanwar was elected president of DUSU while Priyanka Chabri won vice president's post. Ankit Sangwan and Mohit Sangwan have been elected as secretary and joint secretary respectively.

Delhi University introduced NOTA in 2016-17 and a large number of voters preferred it.

Only 36.2% of students cast their ballot+ in DUSU polls in 2016-17. The turnout was the lowest since 2011 when it was 36.5%.

On Friday, the morning turnout was approximately 33%, significantly lower than last year's overall turnout of 43.3%. In fact, voter turnout in 2013-16 has hovered around 43%. In 2010, only 36% of students cast their vote.

Voters and students' outfits blamed the DU administration for the poor turnout.

One reason for the poor turnout was because four colleges — Ramjas, Law Faculty, Ramanujan and Bhaskaracharya College of Applied Science — did not conduct their internal students' union polls along with the DUSU elections. The admission chaos and delay in declaration of results were other reasons attributed for the low turnout.