No Students Union election in Cachar College, GC College: What explains this reality

Recently there was a Students’ Union election in Cotton University and Abhishek Mahanta got elected as the general secretary. The hype around the elections was high as the students got involved in electing the body that will represent them in highs and lows. However, have you wondered why the two biggest colleges in Barak Valley don’t hold Students Union Election?

It was way back in 2012, the prestigious Gurucharan College held a Students’ Union Election. Similarly, Cachar College witnessed its last Students’ election in 2017. Since then, no wall painting, no election campaigning, no “Vote for ABVP/NSUI/SFI/Others”. From what we’ve known, it’s not like that, student’s are not interested or they aren’t active. The administration also is not against the elections, is what we’ve been told. Barak Bulletin was very curious to know the history behind and we went deep into it.

There are over three student organisation bodies in both Gurucharan College and Cachar College, Silchar, all the organisations still have active members and student body, but no elected Students’ Union. We asked the selected presidents and In-charge of these organisations about their opinions and reason behind the “No Election Policy”.

Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad or ABVP’s former GC College Unit President Snehal Choudhury on the non conducting of elections said, “ABVP has submitted a memorandum to the Principal for the last three years, but we didn’t get any positive response from his office. This year, we decided to launch a protest against it and that’s only when we got some reply from the Principal. He said due to the ongoing pandemic, the elections couldn’t be conducted and also because there were no proper offline sessions. Election is a democratic right but the Principal and the authority don’t seem to be interested. We’ve no idea what they’re trying to hide. During the last 7 to 8 year, we’ve heard nothing but excuses.”

On not conducting elections since the last nine years, the student leader said, “We don’t know what exactly happened after the 2012 elections but what we’ve heard from our seniors is that there was some sort of vote rigging and the ballot boxes were snatched by some party. The Principal has also mentioned during one meeting that, in the last election that was conducted, was followed by curfew as there was unrest in the campus and feud between the two parties. The elections were first cancelled in 2012 for a period of 5 years, but 5 years have passed long back.”

On asking whether the college is free from dirty politics now,  Choudhury party said, “Aristotle said ‘Man outside the state is either a Beast or God’. I rightly believe, man can’t exist without politics. Student politics in Barak begins from GC College and now that our college doesn’t conduct elections, I believe it will hamper the political scene adversely. There won’t be any qualified politicians in the future. In the campus, petty politics might have reduced, but the dirty politics stays and will stay forever.”

Echoing the similar voice, Nitesh Tiwari of Cachar College Unit says, “In our college there was an administrative fault, before the pandemic, the administration wasn’t proper, also the college had no permanent Principal for which the election wasn’t conducted. This year we’ve proposed to the authority for conducting elections and if it’s not conducted, then we will adopt the path of protest.”

When asked about whether petty politics inside the campus has reduced, he said, “I don’t believe that it has reduced, between some sections of students it might have but there’s a strong leftist hold on the campus. They brainwash students starting from the first semester of college and use them to satisfy their selfish desires and create unrest.” On the disadvantages of not conducting elections since the last 5 years, Nitesh Tiwari said, “The leadership quality among us has definitely reduced, election is our democratic right and we are denied that. We’re not getting the right scope to channelise our work and some students fall prey to petty party politics who are only involved in creating unrest.”

On the other hand, the student wing of the Indian National Congress or National Students’ Union of India (NSUI) Cachar College unit President Saurav Das says, “There are many issues and problems the students face everyday that are not being addressed and won’t be addressed unless there’s an elected student’s body. No matter how much we complain, power must be given to the students for better. Since the last 6 years there have been no elections in the campus and there’s no leadership as well.” On being asked why elections are important in the college, he said, “without elections the overall development of a student in college remains incomplete. For the holistic growth of a student, elections must be held. For those who contest or campaign and even for those who just participate, both the section is keeping a close eye on one of the biggest celebrations of democracy, that is election. For the last 5 years we were denied this right, but this year we’ve sent a memorandum to the office of the Principal, otherwise we will be bound to go on strike.”

Unit committee head of NSUI GC College, Jonmejoy Choudhury said, “We’ve repeatedly written to the guardian of our college that is Principal. We cannot do anything without him. The reason why elections are not held now is not clear to us because we never got any positive response from the Principal or the authorities. It was last held 10 years back and the reason why it’s not being held now is not known to us.” When asked whether this has reduced the college politics he said, “This has made certain people profitable in the game, those who have connections. Students should get involved in politics and not just avoid it by calling it a “dirty game”. Students should get involved in politics of the campus and elections must be conducted because there are very minute issues which might not be visible to the college authority, but it affects the lives of the students. Only elected student representatives can help solve them.”

To know more about this we also knocked the doors of the principals of the two colleges, Prof. Siddhartha Sankar Nath, the Principal of Cachar College has said, “Our college is not against student’s election. In fact we’ve received memorandums from different students for conducting the elections and we have asked for the permission of the District Administration for conducting the elections this year. In the previous years, the elections were not held due to the Covid pandemic and this year too we can’t assure anything without the District Administration’s consent.” When we asked why elections were withheld after 2017, he said, “I am unable to comment on this because I’ve joined this college only in 2019 and it won’t be wise to comment on the issues of 2017-18.”

Principal of Gurucharan College, Dr. Bibhas Deb on the other hand denied any comments and said, “I don’t want to comment on this right now due to certain circumstances. It won’t be possible at this moment to say anything about the elections or why it was called off.” When asked whether election would be a good idea this year, he said, “only time can say it, you’ll get to know with time”.

It remains to be seen whether elections will be conducted this year among the students or not.

Cachar district committee of the SFI or other leftist students’ union were unreachable for comments for this article.