CHANDIGARH, Aug 5: Students issues and issues concerning the welfare of the campus are being ignored at the meetings of the Panjab University syndicate. Instead the entire energy of university syndics is being spent on debating on appointments and promotions in the campus.In the past three syndicate meetings, the focus has been on intense politicking with various groups trying to out do others with lung power. Issues concerning students find a cursory mention and are being passed with little debate.A major issue concerning students has been that of admissions. Nearly two months ago, the admission committee suggested drastic changes in the admission procedure and which was to affect the career of nearly 3,000 students. The issue which came up before the syndicate, was not even discussed. In fact two months after it was passed, people were unaware of the regulations as well as its implications. The past two syndicate meetings for instance have spent hours debating on appointments.Students have had to resort to dharnas even for trivial issues like declaration of results because of reluctance on the part of the university syndicate to consider their demands.PUSU meetingMeanwhile, a general body meeting of the Punjab University Students Union (PUSU) was held at the Students Centre where Sudhir Kamboj was appointed convenor of the party and Harvinder Pal Singh the senior vice-president. Jagdeep Singh `JD', Harsharn Singh Hundal and Pooja Kaushal are the three vice-presidents, Mohan Singh Moni and Parminder Sidhu, the joint secretary, while Amarjeet Singh Happy and Ashok Kumar are the press secretary and the finance secretary respectively.New PUTA presidentSatya P. Gautam of the Department of Philosophy is the new president of the Panjab University Teachers Association (PUTA). He was declared the president of the association as the other candidate withdrew his nomination. P.D.Sharma of the Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences has also been declared elected unopposed for the post of treasurer.The contest for the three others posts, vice-president, secretary and joint secretary will be a straight one. For the post of vice-president, K.P. Singh of the Department of Physics will be pitted against Surinder Sekhon of the Department of Correspondence studies. For the post of secretary, the two candidates are Navdeep Goyal of the Department of Physics and M Rajivlochan of the Department of History. Harjinder Singh of the Department of Chemistry and Tankeshwar Kumar of the Department of Physics are the two contestants for the post of joint-secretary.For the post of executive members, Dhanraj Sharma (Sanskrit), Manjit Singh (sociology), Surinder Singh (history), Swarnjit Mehta (geography) and V K Singh (central Asian studies) are the five contestants for the four posts in the first group. In the second group, all four candidates: M P Sharma (botany), Rajan Gaur (anthropology), Tejvir Singh (chemistry) and Vikas Bist (mathematics) have been declared elected as executive members. In the third group, Anjala Maharishi (Indian theatre), D N Jauhar (laws) and N.S. Mann (physical education) have been declared elected. K.K. Sharma (evening studies) and Jaspal Kaur Kaang (correspondence courses) have been elected from group four and five respectively.
