Candidates for JNU Students’ Union election declared

SFI, AISA, AISF and DSF come together to form united Left panel to fight ABVP

Candidates for the Jawaharlal Nehru University Students’ Union election, to be held on September 6, were declared on Wednesday.

The Students’ Federation of India (SFI), All India Students’ Association (AISA), All India Students’ Federation (AISF) and the Democratic Students’ Federation (DSF) joined hands to form a united Left panel to take on the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP).

The other student organisations in the presidential race are the National Students’ Union of India (NSUI), the Birsa Ambedkar Phule Students’ Association (BAPSA) and the students’ wing of the Rashtriya Janata Dal. There is one independent candidate in the race who has also thrown his hat into the race for President of the JNUSU.

The united Left panel’s candidate for president Aishe Ghosh said that the association of the Left at JNU was not symbolic but based on everyday hard work that activists put in for the student community and their concerns.

Key issues

She said that the Left panel would uphold the democratic and progressive ethos of the campus, would resist all administrative and Right-wing assaults on JNU. The Left unity panel would fight for decent accommodation for every student, improvement of transport facilities and gender justice on campus, she said.

The ABVP’s presidential candidate Manish Jangid said, “The ABVP would focus on issues affecting daily life of students like poor living conditions, social justice in admission policy and establishing placement cells.” He said that the ABVP was the single largest student organisation on campus and it worked on real campus issues. The ABVP attacked the Left leaders for not being on campus and focusing on student issues. Instead it helped their leaders fight elections in different parts of the country, the Right-wing unit claimed.

BAPSA’s presidential candidate Jitendra Suna said that it would fight for marginalised students and would challenge the binary of the Left and Right-wing forces. NSUI’s candidate Prashant Kumar and RJD’s student wing candidate Priyanka Bharati also promised to work towards a better campus. Independent candidate Raghavendra Mishra called for the construction of a Saraswati temple on campus.