United Left makes clean sweep at JNU Student Union polls

After weeks of campaign for the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) students' union elections, the United-Left alliance retained all four seats by defeating the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS)-backed Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) with considerable margins on Sunday.

The United Left candidate Geeta Kumari won the President's post by defeating Nidhi Tripathi of ABVP by 464 votes.

Speaking to reporters here, Geeta said, "The credit for mandate goes to students because people still believe that democratic spaces should be saved and right now, the only resistance is from students." She promised to take up Najeeb issue, JNU seat cuts, new hostels, saving the autonomy of JS-cash and deprivation points."

While, Shabana Ali of Birsa Ambedkar Phule Students' Association (BAPSA) garnered 935 votes, out of the total 4,639 votes polled, 4620 were valid as 19 votes were discarded after voters put their slips in wrong ballots, election panel officials said.

Meanwhile, for vice president's post, All India Students' Association (AISA) Simone Zoya Khan got 1,876 votes out of total 4,620 votes. She had an easy sweep by defeating Durgesh Kumar of ABVP who got 1028 votes.

Duggirala Srikrisha (Left) won on the General Secretary's post by polling 2082 votes. He was followed by ABVP's Nikunj Makwana- 975 votes.

"We promise to reach out to students' everyday and counter the aggressive policies of ABVP. JNU has become more democratic." Duggirala said. He also vowed to defend the debate and dissent culture in JNU.

However, the post of Joint Secretary has gone to Shubhanshu Singh (Left) who got 1755 votes, while Pankaj Keshari of ABVP got 920 votes.

In the central panel, a total of 1512 NOTA votes were polled for all the four posts.