Maharashtra student elections deferred: State education minister Vinod Tawde
State higher education minister Vinod Tawde announced in the cabinet that the Universities Act will be amended to empower the cabinet to postpone the student council elections in the event of the schedule of state elections overlapping or due to any law and order situation or natural calamities.
The student council elections which were scheduled to be conducted in September have now been postponed by the Maharashtra state cabinet on Wednesday due to the forthcoming state assembly elections.
State higher education minister Vinod Tawde announced in the cabinet that the Universities Act will be amended to empower the cabinet to postpone the student council elections in the event of the schedule of state elections overlapping or due to any law and order situation or natural calamities.
“A representation was made by senior officials of the police and state administrative department requesting the government to postpone the student elections as they would be busy in the preparations of the assembly elections in September. We will definitely complete the student council elections before the end of this year,” said Tawade.
The Savitribai Phule Pune University (SPPU) last week announced its election schedule. Voting, counting and results all were scheduled for September 7. Similarly, 11 other universities were in the process of announcing their election schedule.
Student representatives of various organisations are disappointed with the decision.
Ruksana Shaikh Patil, state general secretary of National Students Union of India (NSUI), said, “The decision taken by the state government is shocking and students who were looking forward to these elections are now demoralised. We were already working out our strategies by conducting meetings, so we want to appeal to the government to rethink their decision.”
Kuldeep Ambekar, president of Students Helping Hand, said, “The decision to postpone student elections has led to confusion. We were planning for it and had started working on our strategies. All our volunteers were actively working to line-up various programmes, but now we all are disturbed.”
Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) has criticised the decision and Purva Bhawalkar, ABVP’s Pune Mahanagar office Mantri, said, “We were happy that after almost 25 years student elections were returning to the state, but postponing the election dates is not acceptable and we oppose this decision of the state government.”