In run up to JNU polls, SFI finds its Ambedkar

After finding out what what the leader had done for the Dalits, his father decided to name his child after Ambedkar. “I was born several years later,” he says.

Ambedkar’s first brush with Left politics happened in Nizam College, Hyderabad. “It was difficult for rural students to come together as a group, so we decided to join SFI to defeat the communal forces,” he says.

SFI, the student wing of the Communist Party of India, Marxist, has given JNU 18 of its 30 students’ union presidents. Despite the records, the university denied SFI — which boasts of Prakash Karat and Sitaram Yechury as members — even a single seat in last year’s election.

Last in power in 2006-07, SFI had won the post of the president and that of several councillors. Five years and six elections later (including an interim election), the SFI, in 2013, did not manage a single seat in the 35-member students’ union.

Ambedkar says he is keen to “restore” JNU’s debate culture and claims that the SFI is already a strong force in the campus.

For Ambedkar, the issues remain the same. “There is severe de-politicisation in the campus. According to the JNUSU constitution, two general body meetings are mandatory per semester. We haven’t seen any recently,” he says.

Besides, as JNU struggles to accommodate new comers, alternate accommodation is an area of concern. “Discrimination against SC/ST and OBC candidates in viva voce will also be taken up by the SFI during this election,” he says.

Nominations for all posts of the students union are likely to be filed on September 2, which will start the university’s election process.