Coming to DU? Check out Amity and Sharda too!

When you go to Delhi University as an aspiring student, you may be handed a Delhi University Students’ Union (DUSU) booklet, or an “information bulletin” as they call it. It’s supposed to be something of an introduction to the university, something to make a good impression.

Take a look at this year’s information bulletin.

We’ll get to what’s inside the booklet, but let’s just look at front and back covers. On the front cover is an ad for Amity University. Turn it around and you see an ad for Sharda University. It’s almost as though DUSU is telling prospective students that there are options other than DU for them to consider.

Why and how can a public university’s admission information bulletin carry ads of private ones?

If you thought the covers were bizarre, you should look inside. There’s a full page advertorial titled “About Sharda University”, which was “bricked in 1996” and has “tunneled (sic) out to the euphoria of success and trained more than 40,000 students through moralistic academic units”. Amity gets two full pages to advertise its courses and facilities, and one page in which you can get to know their vice-chancellor a little better.

While it’s true that, thanks to impractical cut-offs, an enormous percentage of those who apply for admission in DU fail to get through, surely it’s a little too generous for the Akhil Bharatiya Vidhayarathi Parishad (ABVP)-led DUSU to actually nudge the aspirants in the direction of other universities, surely.

When asked about the ads, DUSU Secretary Anjali Rana said she hadn’t gone through the bulletin but disclosed that “saara arrangement Chattarpal ne kiya tha, uski family relation mein hain jinhonne sponsorship dilwaya hai (Chattarpal, DUSU’s Joint Secretary, had made all the arrangements for information bulletin. His relatives have got the sponsorship).”

This is possibly why Chhattarpal Yadav’s message to students — which includes him dedicating this bulletin to the Vice Chancellor — gets a full page. The other four DUSU office bearers, including the president, get a few lines and are crammed into a single page.

The wonders of this bulletin don’t end here. With typos like “collecje” and “D,elhi”, the bulletin is not necessarily the best introduction to the University’s academic standards. In case you thought academics are all fun and no play, there are sections titled “Masti k! Paathshala” and “A Little South of Sanity”.

The 34-page bulletin carries a message from Vice chancellor Yogesh Tyagi and Proctor Professor Satwanti Kapoor, who wasn’t available for comment. Delhi University Teachers’ Association (DUTA) president Nandita Narain described the ads as “completely unacceptable.” Narain, who is leading the DUTA protest against the UGC regulations 2016, said,“These universities, in fact, are in competition with Delhi University. It’s not something appropriate from student representatives to promote private players.” She saw the ads as an extension of the support that the Bharat Janata Party (BJP)-led government has shown to private universities with its compliance to the World Trade Organisation-General Agreement on Trade in Services requirements.

Finally, the bulletin also briefs aspirants about ABVP-led DUSU’s achievements between 20014-16, which include “protesting against the anti-national elements of JNU (Jawaharlal Nehru University).” What they failed to mention was DUSU President Satender Awana threatening a female journalist from Quint. Last year the Quint journalist was allegedly abused by Awana when she was on assignment. Awana allegedly abused her for asking “ashlil” questions and being on campus without DUSU’s express approval. In March this year reportedly, Awana and eight others were booked for in a dowry case.

With towering figures like these, perhaps it makes sense that the DUSU bulletin would rather direct students to other universities.