The Delhi High Court on Tuesday issued a notice to Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), seeking its stand on a petition seeking a renomination and re-election to the post of General Secretary in the recently concluded student polls at the university.
The petition, filed by four PhD students, stated that at 2 a.m. on March 22 — merely seven hours before the commencement of voting in the JNU Students’ Union (JNUSU) polls — the JNU election committee “arbitrarily” cancelled the candidature of Swati Singh, the United Left Panel’s contender for the General Secretary post.
The petition added that on March 19, the last day of campaigning, a complaint against Ms. Singh had been filed by Vikas Patel, the secretary of the right-aligned Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad, which alleged that the left candidate had “proctorial fines” pending against her and therefore, according to polling rules, was prohibited from contesting the election.
The students’ advocate contended that the complaint had been deliberately filed at the last moment in order to “sabotage” the elections. She added that ballot papers had continued to bear Ms. Singh’s name in the pre-lunch period on polling day, creating “confusion” among the voters.
“At 9.30 a.m., polling was abruptly halted for two hours and commenced again 1t 11.15 a.m., possibly to strike off Ms. Singh’s name from the ballot papers, the plea stated.
The petitioners added that they were aggrieved by the fact that since so many students had already cast their vote by that time, their votes were invalidated for no fault of theirs.
On March 24, the election committee declared that the United Left Panel swept three seats out of four in the election, while the Birsa Ambedkar Phule Students’ Association (BAPSA) candidate won the General Secretary post after the left-aligned outfit had chosen to back it after the cancellation of Ms. Singh’s nomination.
The high court will hear the petition again on April 25.
