While dismissing a petition seeking direction to stay the Delhi University Students Union (DUSU) election, a bench headed by Justice Arijit Pasayat observed that: “'The students should elect a leader who should be a role model, not a student who has muscle and money power”.

“All these student leaders are full time leaders and part time students, We will not allow this. Lakhs of rupees are being spent in a student union election. Students are outbidding even the Lok Sabha candidates in spending money,” the court observed and allowed the DUSU election to be conducted on Friday.

“We will not allow the colleges and universities to run a course in dadagiri and gundagiri,” the court observed.

Additional Solicitor General (ASG), appearing for the government, submitted that there was a paradigm shift in student politics in recent times and academics should be given more importance than such politics.

By making it a big fanfare, the academic atmosphere should not be spoiled, said the bench while justifying the recommendations of the Lyngdoh Committee for curbing money, posters and vehicles during the election in colleges and universities.

The Students Federation of India (SFI) had challenged the order of the Delhi High Court seeking a stay on the elections on the grounds that the nomination papers of several candidates in different colleges were rejected due to the fresh scrutiny conducted on a direction by the court, resulting in several elected posts going uncontested.

The High Court last month had directed the Delhi University and its affiliated colleges to implement the Lyngdoh Committee recommendations approved by the Supreme Court.

Justice S Ravinder Bhatt of Delhi High Court had passed the direction on a petition by Vikas Dahiya, an Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (AVBP) leader, whose nomination papers for the post of DUSU president were rejected citing a code that bars candidates from contesting if he had not cleared his papers in the preceding year.