HC intervenes, Kerala University postpones campus polls

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Following a high court directive, the Kerala University has postponed the college union elections scheduled for Tuesday.
The university said in a statement here on Monday that the election is being postponed following a stay order of Kerala High Court and the new date would be announced later. Despite the call for postponement of the election from various quarters, the CPM dominated university syndicate had decided to conduct the election.The university had in fact revised the examination schedule to facilitate the election.
Considering a petition filed by a postgraduate student named PK Vineetha, Justice Raja Vijayaraghavan V issued an order directing the university not to conduct the elections for the next 10 days. She pointed out that the election was scheduled without considering the grave Covid situation in the state.
SFI state president VA Vineesh said SFI was pushing for the conduct of the election as the democratic forums on campus were inactive for more than two years now. The demands raised by other student organisations, including AISF, that the college election should be postponed were loaded with political motives, he said. SFI candidates won unopposed in more than 30 college campuses of Kerala University, he added.
All student unions, except SFI, had requested university authorities to postpone the elections. The Kannur University is about to hold the election on Friday. While Calicut University on Monday decided to finalise the election date at the next syndicate meeting on January 28, the MG University is yet to announce the schedule.
KSU state president KM Abhijith said the SFI leaders were pressing for the election with an eye on the university funds. “Majority of students are not on campus. It won’t be fair to conduct elections at this time,” he said. AISF state secretary J Arun Babu said that it is not the right time to conduct elections on campus.