SFS leader Kanupriya addressing to students at Student centre ahead of Students election at Panjab University in Chandigarh on Tuesday, September 04 2018. Express photo by Jasbir Malhi
Around 50 percent students cast their votes in the Panjab University Campus Student Council election today, on Thursday, according to the preliminary information. The student polls concluded around 11:30 in the morning. The low turnout in the campus polls is attributed to the long weekend prior to the election day. The student leaders said they did not get ample time to reach out to the voters. “The turnout has remained low because of the holidays. There was less time to interact with the students to convince them to participate in the polls,” Nishant Kaushal, PUCSC 2016 president, said.
The departments with highest number of votes like UILS and Department of Laws witnessed low polling.
Six candidates, namely — Kanu Priya from the SFS, Amandeep Singh from the PSU Lalkaar, Anuj Singh from the NSUI, Iqbalpreet Singh Takhar from the SOI+INSO+ISA+HIMSU+PPSO+HPSU alliance, Ashish Rana from the ABVP+SFPU+HSA alliance and Ravinder Bir Singh Randhawa from the PUSU+HPSU alliance are in the race for the post of president. Seven candidates are contesting for vice-president and four each for general secretary and joint secretary.
Only one woman is in the fray for the presidential post while there are two for vice-president and one for joint secretary. The major parties in the fray are National Students Union of India (NSUI), Students for Society (SFS), PSU Lalkaar, Students Organisation of India (SOI), Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) and Panjab University Students Union (PUSU).
The NSUI, SFS and PSU Lalkaar are the only parties fighting without any alliance while SFS and PSU Lalkaar have only named presidential candidates this year.
“The competition is directly between NSUI and SFS. However, there is also a fear that the ABVP may also win because of the official backing from university,” said Sukhcharan Singh, a final year student of Department of Laws.
There are 162 polling booths in place across the campus. As many as 123 department representatives (DR) will also be elected along with the four office-bearers of the PUCSC. The counting of votes for the office-bearers will be held at the Gymnasium Hall and the counting of votes for DRs will be held at the respective departments.