Senate bypoll: Mahajan withdraws

CHANDIGARH: On the last day of withdrawal of nominations for the by-election for a senate seat to be held on September 25, VK Mahajan withdrew his papers. The fight would now be between former PUTA president Manjit Singh and Chatrath-group candidate Ronki Ram.
The seat fell vacant after AK Sahijpal, who was a senate member and director of University Institute of Applied Management and Sciences, retired.Four nominations were filed by Manjit Singh from sociology department, M Shakeel Khan, chairperson department of Urdu, Ronki Ram, professor of political science department and VK Mahajan from evening studies department.
However, Mahajan and earlier, Shakeel withdrew their papers.
Out of the 127 persons who would exercise their franchise, 51 are house members, 49 professors and 27 additional members. Sources said the ongoing rift between GK Chatrath group and Ashok Goyal group would give mileage to Manjit Singh.
Senate is PU’s governing body that takes all decisions related to the varsity and its 178 affiliated colleges.