Elections of the Executive Committee of the Delhi University Students’ Union (DUSU) saw major unrest after a voter, Gaurav Sharma, a central council member of Sri Guru Nanak Dev Khalsa College, alleged that somebody had forged his signature and voted on his behalf. When he complained to the authority then, instead of taking the matter seriously, his complaint was dismissed his claims and he was asked to leave the Conference Centre (voting venue).
Soon Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) and the National Students’ Union of India (NSUI) got the whiff of the matter which led to a scuffle between police and students that resulted in minor property damage. DUSU President and NSUI member Rocky Tuseed and DUSU Secretary Mahamedhaa Nagar, who is from ABVP, asked authorities to allow the voter to cast his vote, but their request was refused.Election officer Rajeev Gupta forwarded the complaints of bogus voting to the DU Grievance Cell and further action will now depend on Grievance Cell’s decision.
The results were announced on 27th November. ABVP asserted that they secured eight out of the 11 posts, NSUI announced the win in five of 11 seats. Since there are only 11 candidates in total, which means that both ABVP and NSUI are staking claims on two winners. These two candidates are Naveen Yadav from Motilal Nehru College and Vaibhav Bansal from Rajdhani College. Naveen Yadav identifies as an independent candidate who personally supports NSUI and Vaibhav Bansal has had affiliations with ABVP.
The DUSU EC has 11 members who are chosen from presidents and central councillors of various college unions. Constitution of DUSU ensures that at least two out of 11 EC members should be girls. The Executive Committee is entrusted with an important task of proposing the DUSU annual budget which is then sent to the Central Council for approval.
A total of 146 people including all members of DUSU voted in the EC elections. Initially 18 candidates contested for 11 EC seats, but in the end only 14 contested owing to the withdrawal of nominations. In this sense, one can say that the selection process wasn’t very competitive in terms of numbers.
Feature Image Credits: The Indian Express
(With inputs from The Indian Express and Hindustan Times)
Niharika Dabral
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