Parties court students with varied promises, come up with manifestos

 NEW DELHI: Delhi University Students’ Union (DUSU) polls are just three days away and the candidates are now doing everything to make themselves heard. On Monday, both the lead contenders — the National Students’ Union of India (NSUI) and the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) — released their manifestos, promising a slew of reforms. ABVP candidates with their party manifesto on Monday. (From left) ABVP state secretary Rohit Chahal, vice-presidential candidate Gourav Choudhary, presidential candidate Ankit Choudhary, and Ritu Rana, candidate for the post of secretary.SONU MEHTA/HT NSUI is focusing on improving college infrastructure. The party wants to see the presently vacant 4,000 teaching and 5,000 non-teaching posts filled. “We are looking at introducing a students’ charter along with the construction of new hostels and colleges on the 95acre university land that has not been used. Since the union does not have any executive powers, it can at best only strive for these issues and keep following them up with the university administration,” said Aroon Hooda, NSUI's presidential candidate. Riding high on the recent Unmukt Chand case, in which the young cricketer was promoted to the second year despite failing in the first, the party is also looking at persuading the to provide attendance credit to students. DU should compensate NCC cadets and outstanding sports-persons with attendance and additional marks. We have demanded that to encourage more students to be part of it, NCC should be introduced as an optional subject in the curriculum,” said Varun Chaudhary, secretary candidate from NSUI. ABVP’s manifesto too focuses on student-centric reforms. “There should be a hike in the funds for scholarships of poor and meritorious students. We will also strive for uniformity in scholarships to SC/ST/physically handicapped students, irrespective of the state they come from,” said Rohit Chahal, state secretary, ABVP. In addition to the long-standing debate on providing better conveyance to off-campus college students and free WiFi in colleges d hostels, the party is also looking at expanding the range of the university campus to west and east Delhi. “We demand that facilities provided by all colleges should be uniform and administration should be decentralised. So, we would struggle for the establishment of east and west campuses and also demand for a law faculty at the east campus,” Chahal added