When the campus came alive!
Innovative ways
The girls of Mount Carmel College campaigned with full gusto for their union elections
Elections bring out the best in students. Whatever one may say about the need
to have a union in college, students always give their best when given an opportunity to try out their hand at democratic practices.
It’s the time when students’ creativity peak and they explore the elections with fanfare. The Mount Carmel Degree College election campaigns were held last week and the winners were declared a day later.
The students were allowed to campaign only during breaks and if one happened to hop by the college during those breaks, one would have seen a riot of creativity.
There was one group that came dressed in different colours every day, all in an effort to promote their candidate.
Another group walked around the campus with the name of the candidate tattooed and painted on their cheeks, arms, and the more creative among them wore T-shirts with the names of the candidates.
In addition to relentless screams, shouts and whistles, another group was spotted walking around the campus with plates and spoons (all brought from their homes). These plates doubled up as drums and spoons became sticks.
This was the scene during the election campaign. This was followed by speeches by the candidates a day later.
Elections were held thereafter and the winners were declared. Metrolife interacted with
the newly-elected student union members of the Mount Carmel Degree College to get a peek into their election experience and asked them what their plans for the academic year were.
The young girls seemed very confident and clear about their vision. The new student union comprises: Gayathri Kunte (president), Jyotsna Sripada (vice-president), Meghana Harinath (cultural secretary), Kulsum Mohamed Ahmed (assistant cultural secretary), Sonia Maria (general secretary) and Varsha Sannuthi (treasurer).
Gayathri Kunte pegged her campaign around the theme ‘Be the change’. She hopes to take students’ participation in intra-collegiate and regional fests to a greater height, “I hope to get the students to work hard and participate better in activities within the college,” says Gayathri.
Adding to Gayathri’s view, Jyotsna Sripada says that the union will work towards building and creating an eco-friendly campus.
“We will initiate eco-friendly, environmentally sustainable measures on campus. We will inculcate in the students the importance of keeping the campus clean,” she adds.
Kulsum Mohamed Ahmed confesses that first the campaign and later, winning the elections were altogether new experiences and these have made her a more responsible individual. Her symbol during the campaign was an owl.
She reasons that an owl keeps a watch at night when everybody sleeps. “I intend to work overtime to ensure that I give my best to the union,” she observes.
Finally, Meghana Harinath too has a list of things that she would like to implement in the forthcoming academic year.
“First, we will begin with implementing the cycle project on campus which is an environmentally sustainable measure. We will promote reusable paper and ban plastic altogether. We will also chalk out a list of educative cultural activities,” Meghana sums up.
