NSUI wants runner-up to take Ankiv Baisoya’s place

NEW DELHI: A day after ABVP’s Ankiv Baisoya resigned from the post of DUSU president over the fake marksheet controversy, head of the Buddhist Studies Department, KTS Sarao, claimed that his admission to the master’s course had been cancelled. DUSU secretary and NSUI member Aakash Choudhary, meanwhile, wrote to the DU vice-chancellor, demanding that the university either conduct a re-election or name NSUI’s Sunny Chillar as the president.
Chillar was the runner-up to Baisoya in the DUSU polls.
NSUI claimed that Lyngdoh Committee guidelines were only advisory in nature and DU could conduct a re-election under the Representation of the People Act, 1951. Addressing the media, AICC joint secretary Ruchi Gupta alleged: “DU administration tried to delay cancellation of Baisoya’s admission to cross the two-month period stipulated under the Lyngdoh panel guidelines for fresh elections.” She added that there were “legally, logically and politically” only two possibilities for DU: either hold a fresh election or name the runner-up as the president.
In a rare show of support, AISA joined forces with NSUI to “address concerns over the fiasco”. NSUI claimed that Baisoya’s resignation was delayed but was a “vindication of our charge that he is a fraud who used a fake certificate to get admission to DU. Baisoya was not a student of DU in this academic year; his admission is null and void. There is no question of ABVP’s Shakti Singh, who is currently DUSU vice-president, being promoted to the president’s post”.
Gupta said if Baisoya’s papers had been duly checked by the administration, he would have been disqualified even before the election results were announced. She said: “DUSU is governed by the university constitution. Nowhere in the constitution is it written that the union shall abide by Lyngdoh panel’s guidelines.”
NSUI said setting a legal precedent in this case was in the interest of justice and rationality. “One of the key purposes of Lyngdoh panel guidelines was to eliminate criminalisation of students’ union elections,” Gupta said.
National media in-charge of ABVP, Monica Chaudhary, dismissed NSUI's claims and said that “Lyngdoh committee guidelines, though not binding, are in practice in not just DUSU but all unions. We must follow that”.