Blog | JNUSU 2025: Shakha Recruitment, Brahminical Dominance, Palestine, And Political Opportunism Dominate Election Discourse
JNU students call the Jawaharlal Nehru University Student Union (JNUSU) elections as biggest festival of the university. As the elections are scheduled on November 4, 2025, the campus is coloured with red, orange, and blue. Electing candidates are pursuing students through vibrant menifostos and recounting the opposition’s flaws. Pamphlets are being distributed, party slogans are being raised, social media is flooded with campaign videos, students gather at canteens and discuss their plans, JNU’s famous dhabas are filled with students discussing university politics and predicting the possibilities of election results.
In the last few days, students gathered at the open theatre of JNU to hear the candidates’ debate. On November 2, the Presidential debate was scheduled, and I got a chance to look at the JNU election process closely and talk to many students studying there.
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Here, I would mention a few topics that I came across in the last few years, hearing about JNU and what students think about it. I basically framed questions around these points.
- Prospects of left/right/others
- Saffronization of the campus
- Brahmanical dominance
- Urban Naxal discourse
- Systemic abuse
- Changes in the admission process
- Restrictions on dissent
- Dominance of the Palestine issue
- Political opportunism among student leaders
- Fee hike issue
- Basic facilities at the campus
For this report, I randomly asked students sitting on dhabas, walking on JNU streets, students from the girls’ hostel, and those who came to attend the Presidential debate (It took me around 6-7 hours of rigorous talking and making notes of their views on different matters).
Left/Right/Others
My first interaction took place with a 4th-year PhD student at the KC complex, while sitting on a thick brown tree branch lying on the big rocks. I asked the student whether they would like to discuss the ongoing student politics on campus, and the student agreed without hesitation. I started with the first issue (I have already written down the topics in my diary and framed some basic questions) from my diary, and asked about the prospect of the election results this year. “Left is coming again. For sure”, the student replied. “Left has a deeper reach among the students and has captured the students’ imagination of the campus atmosphere”, he said.
“ABVP does not seem to have chances as JNU’s politics has remained different from other institutes. Its politics is not defined by muscle and money rather works on an ideological basis. There is a left leaning among the majority of the students in JNU”, he said. “Last year, the joint secretary post was won by the ABVP candidate, and also in 2016, the same post was won by ABVP. However, it has not remained successful in creating an impact on the JNU campus”, the student told. “In fact, the ABVP DUSU president, who was endorsed by the film actor Sanjya Dutt, was seen distributing the pamphlets in the canteen. Such is the situation of ABVP on the JNU campus”, another MA student added a point.
While asking about the ABVP prospects after its performance in DUSU, the student said, “JNU’s politics is different. Here, the mainstream political parties do not have that much interference. Also, the ABVP candidates have been framed for various charges. So, chances are lesser that the ABVP or the rightwing politics can make a groundbreaking success in the JNU campus”.
Another PhD student from Assam has shared his views about the left dominance on the campus and said that the left has remained dominant, and even students from north-east states have supported the left largely. The political issues of the north-east are national rather than ideological and remain related to land and migrant issues, which have not been part of the left, despite that the students from these states remained tilted towards the left on the campus.
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Saffronization of the campus
Upon asking about the attempts at saffronization of the campus and creating communal division among the students, the 4th-year PhD student rejected this notion and said JNU has remained left-leaning despite the BJP government remaining in power for over a decade. Also, ABVP, which has shown violence on other campuses, has remained ineffective on the JNU campus.
Discussing the recruitment drives in JNU, the 4th-year PhD student mentioned, “There has been a rise in recruitment of those who affiliate themselves with RSS ideology. On campus, we term it ‘Shakha Recruitment Cell’. People who have been members of RSS shakha and been associated with the ABVP in the past have been recruited significantly and openly, despite being academically non-efficient in comparison to other applicants. The RSS infiltration in the academic institutions is evident on campus. This tends to harm the academic value after certain years, as the deserving candidates are getting out of the system.”
To answer this question, many students, however, did not deny the fact that people with RSS have been recruited in the past, but also said that this has followed the past trends. Even during the Congress time, people who have followed the central government’s whip have been a part of the system.
Also, the lack of any independent body for the recruitment at central universities has played a major role. One PhD student even suggested having a UPSC kind of constitutional body or the recruitment according to the state university process, for central university recruitments, such as JNU, to get rid of this ideologically based selection.
Brahmanical dominance in recruitments
Questions have been raised against the JNU recruitment process, the 4th-year PhD student said, “Indeed, the recruitment trends over the years have shown that people from upper castes have dominated the academic circles of JNU. This has continued in the last 10 years”. The student mentioned three examples: one of Saurabh Sharma, appointed as an assistant professor at the school of computational and integrative sciences, Shruti Agnihotri, assistant professor at the Spanish centre, and another student (name not mentioned) who has been part of ABVP, remained affiliated with the RSS, and belongs to the Brahmin caste. As per the student, these three examples are a clear reflection of how people from the upper caste and RSS affiliation, despite not possessing the teaching abilities and impressive academic background, were given academic posts. Also, the PhD student mentioned that the brahmanical hegemony on the JNU campus is not new, but rather has been part of both the left and right.
One PhD scholar showed me the data of recruitment showing over 50% upper caste selections, which went down after the 1990s. He said that the BJP government has focused on OBC politics. He mentioned that the discourse of upper caste domination is created by those who recruited such people in the past. Also, the left has remained aloof from the OBC politics and upper caste recruitments as it focuses on the class-based politics and not the caste based politics.
Urban-Naxal discourse
On the issue, the PhD student, along with his MA friend, said that the Urban-Naxal discourse has become an evident part of the politics since 2016. An anti-national drive has been working against the left in JNU. The vilification through media, movies such as Tandav, and Jahangir National University (JNU) was attempted to create a public perception that JNU is producing anti-national elements. Also, JNU students were represented as a burden on taxpayers’ money. The shutdown JNU campaign from 2016-2018 was a reflection of such attempts. Also, media narratives were used against the JNU in the shutdown campaign. Students were accused of having an affiliation with the Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand Naxals. Also, DSU, the group to which Umar Khalid was affiliated, has been disbanded now, a student said.
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Change in the admission process.
On inquiring about the impact of the change in the entrance examination pattern, the MA student sitting along with the PhD student said, “Earlier, JNU used to hold its own exams, and they were descriptive tests. But now the examination is conducted by the NTA through CUET PG, which has made the process and selection mechanical. Now, people who think critically about the issues have dropped, as the place has been taken over by those who are good at maths and arithmetic. The campus is now dominated by the Kota factory products who take coaching and crack the exam. This may compromise the intellectual minds on the campus. Also, those who live in marginal places and can not afford coaching and are not good at maths have been eliminated from the race”.
However, the PhD student shared some different views and, despite agreeing on the points given above, said that the objective examination pattern has democratized the selection process, as earlier students from Delhi University or other premier educational institutes who had good writing skills were getting selected. This has changed the demography of the students at the campus, as now students with average writing skills can be selected. However, this has for sure made the process mechanical, and the critical minds have gone down, he added.
Political opportunism among student leaders
“The mainstream politics does not impact the JNU politics significantly; however, student leaders, whether from left, right, or other parties, seek political opportunism and future political prospects. Whether it’s Mohit Panday, who heads the Congress central committee, or NSUI president Kanhaiya Kumar, leaders mostly seek future political prospects. Student leaders do not even hesitate to change political parties in the future”, a student said.
Restrictions on dissent
Students have faced administrative restrictions on protests and meetings. Sometimes, lights get turned off, microphones are switched off, fine is imposed on students for defying the orders. However, students held protests and opposed the wrong decisions despite the restrictions, another student told. Also, the kind of intervention of the Delhi Police, which is seen in other universities, is not that prominent on the JNU campus. The police are not called on campus to resolve disputes, and the state’s direct intervention is not seen in day-to-day security-related matters.
Dominance of the Palestine issue
I approached a female PhD student who has been a councillor from ABVP, said that the left has majorly focused on the Palestine issue and has neglected the issue of students on campus. Funds-related issues, infra matters, health, hygiene, and fellowship-related matters were neglected by the central panels in the past. To the left defence during the presidential debate, Danish Ali, Joint Secretary candidate, said that India has earned its freedom fighting against imperialism and will keep supporting other countries that are facing it even today.
Fee Hike
JNU students are presented as living for free; however, the reality is different, a student said. “Every month, an average student spends nearly 4-5k on campus hostel charges and tuition fees. Though the tuition fee could be lower in comparison to other institutes, it’s the maintenance charges that are similar to other universities,” a PhD student said.
“A video of Delhi CM Rekha Gupta was resurfaced, where she allegedly said that JNU wants to live free. They can spend hundreds on a pizza but do not want to spend 10 rupees for the campus”, another student mentioned. Reality is not what is shown. Fee hike is a real challenge for those students who come from poor backgrounds and marginal places, he said.
Who dominates the central panel elections this year is another matter, but what I appreciate about the JNU students is their understanding and interest in their representatives, which has helped me to understand the JNU politics (if it is partial) and write this blog.
