The Left Unity panel of AISA and SFI registered a landslide victory in the JNUSU elections. Comrade Mohit Kumar Pandey of AISA was elected JNUSU President, polling 1954 votes, and defeating the nearest opponent from BAPSA by a margin of 409 votes. Comrade Satarupa Chakraborty of SFI was elected General Secretary of the JNUSU, polling 2424 votes, and defeating the rival from ABVP by 1094 votes. Comrade Amal P P of SFI was elected JNUSU Vice-President, polling 2461 votes and defeating the ABVP rival by 1304 votes. Comrade Tabrez Hasan of AISA was elected JNUSU Joint Secretary, with 1670 votes and defeating the opponent from DSF by 362 votes. The Left Unity candidates won 14 out of 15 Councillor seats in the Schools of Social Sciences, Language, Literature and Culture Studies and International Studies, as well as the lone Councillor posts in the School of Arts and Aesthetics and the Part-Time constituency. Independent candidates won the Councillor posts in the Science schools and the Centre for the Study of Law and Governance. ABVP won only a single Councillor post in Sanskrit Studies.
Despite lower turnout, AISA put up strong show in DUSU Elections, polling third and increasing its vote percentage on every post. In spite of facing slander and physical assaults by the ABVP, AISA managed to increase its vote share on every post. On the posts of President, Vice President, Secretary and Joint Secretary AISA saw an increase of 2, 9,8 and 2 percents votes respectively.
The polling in DU was at its historical low this year due to administrative failure to resolve the DUTA evaluation boycott agitation on time, which resulted in a failure to complete admissions and readmissions on time. In spite of this, the DU administration issued a notification that only those who had paid fees till 31 August could vote, thus disenfranchising a major section of students. Further the DU Administration made the mistake of replacing the cut-off system with a merit list system mid-way through the admissions, leading to thousands of vacant seats in the First Year.
The DU administration also failed to control the hooliganism and brazen violations of DUSU code of conduct. Students’ disgust at the waste of paper, the crass display of money power, and open bribery by ABVP and NSUI also contributed to low voter turnout, and was also reflected in AISA’s increased vote share as well as high NOTA votes.
