Delhi walls are usually littered with spray-painted names and party posters calling people to ‘JOIN ABVP/NSUI”. Sometimes, the placement of these posters across the city seem random as they are not in areas that in the Delhi University Campus. But by sticking bills and spraying names, the potential candidates launch an internal fight towards popularity on the basis of which they get tickets for DUSU elections. This is done by cleverly evading Lyngdoh committee guidelines.

Qasim Bhati, NSUI Delhi state secretary, while campaigning in the North Campus area of Delhi University said, “We specifically target North and South campus areas along Kalkaji for posters and fliers. Also, we concentrate more on Outer Ring Road as students coming to Delhi are most likely to see the posters over there.” Some of these areas include Jahangirpuri, Rohini, Vikaspuri, Kalkaji, etc. Additionally, to avoid any action due to flouting Lyngdoh Committee guidelines, the names of the candidates are misspelt. When asked about the money put into the whole election process, the campaigners for both NSUI and ABVP said that either the candidates have a good amount of backing or it is a collaborative effort involving many people. Akshey Laakhra, NSUI Delhi Unit president, said that he has no idea about poster sponsorships. “There are no sponsors for NSUI at least. It is the candidates who spend money on campaigning.”

RSS pracharaks campaigning for ABVP in DUSU elections say, “We have good campus presence. We have organised two rallies the whole day. There are roughly 72 campus areas, of which 52 remain in our focus.” When asked about the continued use of mass-produced printed posters, the ABVP campaign team said that they are considered to be “handmade posters of a kind”. They said that the areas around SSC/UPSC coaching centres like Naraina, Mukherjee Nagar, etc. are important for publicity.

Students walking in the campus do not agree with the methods of publicity. “Candidates can’t ask students to vote for them before the election campaign. In order to evade the restrictions under Lyngdoh committee, they ask students to join a ‘student political organization’,” said a student of Arts Faculty, North Campus. Kajal C, a student of Miranda House, says that due to the flow of money and muscle in the elections, the competition is left undemocratic and unfair for independent candidates.

While NSUI candidate Rocky Tuseed argued for increasing the number of days for campaigning, Saket Bahuguna, ABVP National Media Convener, at the launch of ABVP manifesto said that this increase is necessary to communicate their party agenda clearly. “The issue of paper wastage will also get resolved once you increase the number of days of campaigning.” He adds, “We give tickets to people only on the basis of their capability to fight for students. Yes, they have used posters, but they are not the only ones. Candidates from every student outfit have done this. Right now, we ourselves are demanding a complete overhaul of DU elections. We need to have reforms in this, neither can these elections be carried out within the budget of Rs 5,000 nor is it possible to reach out to 1.35 lakh students in 2 days.”