Amidst the din of the dafli, two young women watched as student leader Neha Bora urged the crowd to vote.
It had been a couple of weeks since Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan had resigned—and Bora had ended her hunger strike. A crowd surrounded her at the gate of the Arts Faculty, singing around her.
The two women, who are post-graduate students of Punjabi at University of Delhi (DU), stood on the edge of the street, far away from the deafening chants of the students, but smiling as they looked at the crowd. They had never voted in a Delhi University Student Union (DUSU) election before. The Quint asked them if they were going to vote this year. The answer was a resounding 'yes'.
“There’s an excitement this time. Delhi University is awake,” Sehaj said.
Days after the protests at Jantar Mantar, thousands of first years and students returned to Delhi to attend their classes at DU. August and September, typically a month of great hullabaloo as freshers enter the red walls of North Campus, is also election time.
With elections to one of Asia’s largest university student unions due on 18 September, candidates roll through the streets each year in their customary Thar vehicles, waving hand-drawn posters, distributing free ice-creams and the endless onslaught of “hello, do you want to join my party?"