Interference of mainstream leaders blamed for PU poll debacle of Congress student wing
The National Students’ Union of India (NSUI), the student wing of the Indian National Congress, performed quite poorly in the Panjab University Campus Student Council (PUCSC) elections on September 5. The party’s presidential candidate trailed to sixth position out of nine and could only secure 501 votes. The party had suffered a split right before elections when the Chandigarh NSUI president Sikander Boora had resigned from the party alleging that the local cadre was ignored by Congress leadership while deciding the president face for the PUCSC elections.
“I was told by a senior NSUI functionary that the selection of presidential candidate from the NSUI was pushed by Punjab Congress president Amrinder Singh Raja Warring. As the Chandigarh NSUI president, I could not agree to it because there were other deserving candidates who could have been asked to contest,” Boora said today.
When contacted, Ludhiana MP Raja Warring refused to comment on the issue.
Boora’s group had fielded 26-year-old Anurag Dalal as their presidential candidate, leading him to victory with 303 votes. It is not the first time that a rebel group emerged from the NSUI. In 2016, some student leaders had deviated from the NSUI and supported the PUSU panel, which swept the polls then.
“It is sad to see that the party which was nurtured and raised on the campus by us is on a downfall. This time the face portrayed on the PU campus could manage only 501 votes, which I believe is a record-time low. The student politics should be left to students and mainstream political leaders should refrain from interfering in it,” said Brinder Dhillon, former campus student leader.
While the NSUI had managed to get their president candidate win in the 2023 poll, it could not manage to get under the same roof to fight elections and ended up managing just the vice-president seat. Even in 2023, the presidential face was a turncoat who had joined the party few days before the poll.
