DUSU Election Result 2019: ABVP bags three posts, NSUI gets one; Akshit Dahiya elected president

The RSS-affiliated Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) on Friday won three posts, including that of the president, in the Delhi University Students' Union (DUSU) polls, while the Congress-backed National Students' Union of India (NSUI) bagged the secretary's post.

Soon after the announcement of the results, celebrations broke out outside the counting centre in Kingsway Camp with supporters dancing to 'dhol' beats and rose petals being showered on the winners.

Akshit Dahiya of ABVP defeated NSUI's Chetna Tyagi for the president's post by a margin of over 19,000 votes. The posts of vice president and joint secretary were won by ABVP's Pradeep Tanwar and Shivangi Kharwal by a margin of 8,574 and 2,914 votes, respectively.

NSUI bagged the secretary's post with its candidate Ashish Lamba defeating ABVP's Yogi Rathee by a margin of 2,053 votes.

"ABVP fielded Yogi Rathee who was college president of Ramjas College when the violence took place in 2017. The students have given a clear mandate against violence," NSUI's Akshay Lakra was quoted as saying by PTI.

The voter turnout in DUSU polls was 39.90 percent in 2019 against the 44.46 percent voter turnout in 2018. Initial trends in counting indicated that the ABVP candidates were leading over their NSUI counterparts.

In 2018, too, ABVP had bagged three seats of the DUSU — president, vice president, and joint secretary — while the NSUI had won the secretary post. After Friday's results, the ABVP wrote on Twitter, "We have done it, yet again!"

The polling concluded amid allegations of malfunctioning electronic voting machines (EVMs). Sixteen candidates, including four women, were in the fray and 52 polling centres were set up. Over 1.3 lakh students were eligible to cast their vote.

As many as 144 EVMs were used for students' union polls and 137 were used for college union polls. The Left-backed All India Students Association (AISA) expressed happiness over improvement in their vote share.

"Our joint secretary candidate Chetna got over 10,000 votes. The party's vote share has improved since last year (2018). We are happy about it," an AISA functionary told PTI.

Union minister Dharmendra Pradhan congratulated the ABVP winners and the "youth brigade" of the organisation for sweeping the DUSU election. He claimed that the results were an indication of the political mood in the country. "Nationalistic ideologies and ethos of ABVP have made it a natural choice for the youth," he said.

With inputs from agencies