AISA maintains hold on JNUSU, wins all top posts

Ultra-left All India Students Association today swept the Jawaharlal Nehru University Student Union elections, winning all the four top posts.
The AISA won the posts of president, vice president, general secretary and joint secretary, retaining its hold over the prestigious students' body. Last year, it had only lost the president's post to SFI-JNU, now known as DSF.
AISA's Akbar Chaudhary was elected president handing down a crushing defeat to Democratic Students Federation (DSF) candidate Ishan Anand. Chowdhary polled 1,979 votes against Anand's 660.
AISA candidates won with big margins except for the post of joint secretary where the difference was just 59 votes.

SFI's Rahul, NSUI's Pran Veer Singh, ABVP's Alok Kumar Singh and Concerned Students' Chandrasen were also in the fray along with Kazakh national Akhmetbekov Zhassulan for the top post, voting for which took place on Friday.
Anubhuti Agnes Bara, Sandeep Saurav and Sarfaraz Hamid, all from AISA, were elected vice president, general secretary and joint secretary respectively.

A total of eight candidates were in the fray for the post of president, five for vice-president, six for general secretary and three for joint secretary.
AISA also clinched most of the councillor's seats in the university's three main schools -- School of Languages, School of International Studies and School of Social Studies - among others.

Besides the central panel, AISA secured 14 councillor seats. Three candidates supported by it also emerged victorious as councillors.
The results of the election were declared today after three days of counting of votes.
Bara polled 1,966 votes against DSF candidate Zeeshan Ali's 914 votes.
In a race of six candidates, Saurav won the post of general secretary polling 1,657 votes. His immediate rival Caroline of NSUI polled 720 votes.
Hamid won the post of joint secretary defeating DSF candidate Sonam Goyal by 59 votes. Hamid polled 1,705 votes against Goyal's 1,646 votes.
"This mandate is against autonomy, commercialisation, and corruption and in recognition of struggles across the country," Bara said, reacting to AISA's victory in the polls.

She said "less weightage for viva-voce, publication of dissertation, increase in merit-cum-means scholarship amount are among the issues AISA plans to take up during its tenure."
Last year, V Lenin Kumar, the candidate of the SFI-JNU (now known as DSF) and AISF alliance, was elected as president of the students body. The other three posts had gone to AISA.
An estimated 56 per cent turnout was recorded for the polling on September 13.