Do you now wish to reconsider your comment on the cluelessness of the Liberal elite? Or did we ducking know something about Bengali culture that you failed to seize? Hindi speaking PMs can come and go, they can win national majorities, but they will struggle to make impact in non-Hindi speaking states. BJP doesn't rule Punjab, Maharashtra, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Andhra, Telangana, Odisha, Bengal - all large non-Hindi (predominantly) speaking states.

It also doesn't rule Rajasthan and Jharkhand, will lose Haryana next time around (farmers), and did not receive electoral mandates in MP or Goa prior to horse trading.

Let that sink in. The infallible ship that you wish for us to worry about has a strong grip only on UP, Bihar, Uttarakhand, Gujarat, Himachal and Assam. Wherever there is a strong non-Congress alternative, they are not unchallengeable.

Congress held similar large swathes over long periods. Look where they are now. Respect the local - don't impose central ideas on us (farm bills, hindi etc.).

Guess the 'liberal elite snobs' had the last laugh here. The cowbelt politics doesn't work in Bengal. Never has and never will. At least the right-wing troll(s) spamming the comments section for the last year and a half about how useless BJP candidates like Swapan Dasgupta, Som Mondal etc. would come to power and become CM, law minister and what else, and how NUJS students should start begging favours from them in anticipation, would keep quiet for the next 4 years. Good riddance! Swapan Dasgupta contested from a constituency with prominent temples etc. to play the religion card and rightly lost by a mile.

For anyone interested, this [...] lost by 75000 votes (https://results.eci.gov.in/Result2021/ConstituencywiseS25161.htm?ac=161).

People are celebrating the fact that a political party that peddles hate politics, unscientific behavior, regressive thoughts and actions, fascism, destruction of democratic institutions, crime against women [moderator note: this claim specifically has been reported and contested as not having factual proof], lies and half-truths, and is also destroying the economy, has not come to power in the state today. The comparison that you have made is completely irrelevant in this context, since the fight was not really between the two parties that you referred to. Sure, the TMC government hasn't done the institution any favour. Would the BJP government have been any better? Hell, no! If anything, they would have done all those evils and more, including syllabus manipulation. They are already trying to do that via UGC and BCI. Even worse, they would have encouraged polarisation of students on religious grounds. These evils are non-negotiable.

Let's leave aside our political leanings and compare how NUJS fared under two different political regimes. All this information is documented and publicly verifiable.

Left rule (until 2011): College was set up at behest of CM Jyoti Basu. Menon as founding VC, Chimni and MP Singh as next 2 VCs. EC/GC members includes several SC judges and Senior Advs like Fali Nariman, KKV and former Sol-Gen Dipankar Gupta. Also Padmavibhushan and noted scientist Raja Ramanna. Lectures set up by economist Kaushik Basu and another chair by family of DD Basu. Nobel laureates Amartya Sen and Joseph Stiglitz visit and give lectures. Upendra Baxi and Justice Ruma Pal held Ford Chair, Shamnad Basheer held MHRD IP Chair. Other profs includes Pritam Baruah, Vishwas Devaiah, Daniel Mathew and Chinmayi Arun. No domicile quota. Before CLAT, NUJS generally regarded as second to NLSIU because of stature of its VCs and quality of faculty. After CLAT introduced, NUJS and NALSAR in close competition for second preference.

TMC rule (from 2011 onwards):Mamata's astrologer appointed to EC. After MP Singh leaves, Ishwar Bhat, Amit Talukdar and NK Chakrabarti as VCs. Initially, TMC party spokesman Suparno Moitra (with zero legal qualifications) is appointed to the selection committee, later removed after students complain. New EC/GC appointees include a little-known college lecturer who is a member of a TMC teachers union. Also appointed is the wife of the Chief Secretary of Bengal (who was earlier controversially appointed as VC of CU and even more controversially awarded Mamata an honorary PhD after her appointment). The number of SC judges and SC Senior Advs on the GC/EC gradually dwindle. The profs named above leave, some head to JGLS and NLUD. Domicile quota introduced, later increased. NUJS falls firmly behind NALSAR in CLAT student preference, and behind NLUJ in NIRF. Repeated letters and petitions by students complaining of maladministration.

As I said, all this information is documented and publicly verifiable. So what are people celebrating?

I hope there will be more campuses of NUJS- in Asansol, Silguri and in other places other places. I hope there will be more NLSIU and NALSAR campuses as well. This exclusionary approach of restricting NLU education for a chosen few must end. It must reach to everyone. It must be accessible for all. I hope that NLU will stop churning heartless, mindless robotic machines for law firms.
CLAT should be organized in vernacular language as well. NLUs must stop serving the elite kids of India!!

Ho gayi bhai neck to neck fight? Even with the help of Election Commission, Central agencies, electoral bonds and horse trading BJP is not able to win Bengal. If the current trend will continue then PK's prophecy will come true.
BJP's defeat in Bengal is the biggest story of the day. Its good for the nation. Its good for NUJS.

You are making it sound like the students are the oppressed populace who are going to experience a change in dictatorship. Doubtless that's how you choose to see a democratic setup, buoyed by your RSS training. Us minuscule liberals still prefer to see it differently. By the way, got your vaccine yet?

Quote:

Absolutely zero chance of the BJP coming to power in the state on Sunday

This comment shows the arrogance and cluelessness of liberal elite snobs. It's 10 am now and the fight is neck and neck. It's time students seriously start to think of life under a new regime, under a different power centre and an EC where probably 80 percent of the people will be replaced. If NLSIU alumni and students can lobby with the BJP govt in Karnataka, what stop NUJS alumni and students from doing so? Many things are pending and need to be thrashed out:

- Action taken on review commission report
- Domicile quota
- Campus infrastructure
- Faculty hires
- Funding from central government and private sector
- MoUs with foreign universities
- NIRF ranking
- Grant of INI status by central govt and parliamentary bill by Meenakshi Lekhi

This is a good point actually. GNLU was also sort of Modi's project, so he wanted it to succeed and pumped it with funds. So i don't know if NUJS can expect the same amount of treatment. But the current government's interference seems to have been terrible. So i hope that really gets better.

With respect to domicile reservation, the BJP brought that in Karnataka for NLSIU. It used to be just something that parties brought up before the elections for some token votes. The
BJP ensured they passed the legislation. So, in terms of domicile, etc, it might not be very different. But a change in administration might happen. For example, whispers suggest that Prof Sudhir was backed by Justice Bobde and indirectly by BJP. Soooo it's hard to say

The fact that you are asking for the apolitical student body of a university to be prepared to devise negotiation strategy in anticipation of the outcome of a political election is sufficient indication of your warped sense of priority and also what's wrong with most of the country today.

Nope. BJP entered into an alliance with the 'Jat Party' post elections.
Promise of reservation was in their manifesto which was released before the elections.
Link:
https://www.financialexpress.com/india-news/haryana-jobs-bjp-manifesto-promises-95-per-cent-reservation-assembly-election-2019-news/1734794/

Absolutely zero chance of the BJP coming to power in the state on Sunday. After that, the horse trading may commence as per their usual record and maybe eventually. There is no reason why the students would have to get involved in the filth. Aren't the BJP supporters claiming that their representatives know exactly what's good for the institution? Then they would know what to do after coming to power even without the students having to tell them.

Just like the governor has lost all the goodwill from the inhabitants of the state for having abused and debased his constitutional authority throughout his term and acting like a party lackey. The governor's position is meaningless now. Didn't BJP just appoint the recently retired Election Commissioner as Goa's governor within a week of his retirement? Goes to show the contempt that these people have towards constitutional positions and supposed impartiality that ought to come along with those.

We need an emergency student GB meeting if there is a government change. Honestly, no one at NUJS even gave a thought to the possibility of a new government, but we may suddenly find ourselves seeing some massive changes and the SJA could be caught completely off guard. I can't see the current power brokers in the faculty still continuing, unless they change their affiliations overnight. Half the EC will probably change.

The big decision makers will be the law minister, advocate general and education minister. I think Swapan Dasgupta will probably be education minister, no clue about the others.

The SJA needs to be on high alert in the next 48 hours.

NLUs need to be market-oriented like IITs and IIMs. They should produce wealth creators and not wealth destroyers. IMO the law course needs to be split into three streams: BSc LLB with science subjects and expertise in tech law, BBA LLB with a business focus and BALLB with a humanities focus The first two courses should cost 2 lakh a year and get heavy funding for good faculty to encourage more students in those streams. The third course should cost 10 lakhs a year and be used to cross-subsidise the first two courses, plus faculty should cost less and classes should be held online to further reduce costs. This is brute market logic and it's what we need. It's fine if you want to study/teach human rights and Marxist philosophy, but don't expect the taxpayer to fund you.

NLUs are important only to the those attending them in a given period (current students), and to an extremely tiny group of alumni who retain the emotional attachment. Institutes charging over 10 lakhs and catering to a politically insignificant group of about 500 students isn't the priority of any political party.

A second campus is a real possibility with a BJP government. They will win a lot of seats in North Bengal and may want a campus there. A campus in Jalpaiguri was proposed by the TMC but scrapped after opposition, but the BJP may go ahead and do it. They will cite Maharashtra and MP as as example and say that a state can have more than one NLU.

But I would prefer that the second campus in Jalpaiguri not be branded as NUJS, but be called something else. Although all the NLUs in Maharashtra have the MNLU brand, in MP you have NLIU and DNLU.

One thing that can be suggested is withdrawal of domicile quota from NUJS and upgradation to an INI, and instead 70% domicile quota in NLU Jalpaiguri. The government can also call the new NLU as NLUJ, to troll Jodhpur :)

2.1 makes an interesting point. Has any BJP government created a reputed NLU?

NLSIU was set up under Chief Minister Ramakrishna Hegde from the Janata Dal. He was a friend of BCI chairman Ram Jethmalani and agreed for NLSIU to be set up there. NALSAR was set up by Chandrababu Naidu from the TDP, who invited Ranbir Singh and gave him a lot of freedom and funding. NUJS was set up by Jyoti Basu of the CPIM, who invited Madhava Menon and similarly gave him support. NLUJ was set up during Ashok Gehlot's time (Congress), while NLIU was set up during Digvijay Singh's time (also Congress). NLUD was set up under Sheila Dixit (also Congress). I think only one reputed NLU was set up under a BJP government (GNLU) and it was actually when Modi was CM there. The BJP's track record was mixed. The founding VC was one of India's top scholars (VS Mani), but after he left a total scoundrel took over (Bimal Patel). However, the BJP government no doubt gave a lot of funding to GNLU which is very important.

Coming to Bengal, Mamata Banerjee's government has been very destructive and she has harmed universities through needless politicisation. Her law minister and advocate general have interfered a lot in the college and the SJA has written an open letter criticising the AG, which never happened before (I think LI has reproduced that letter). She even once appointed her astrologer to the EC (I think LI reported that too).

Thus, I think we can say that a BJP CM will possibly be less destructive for NUJS. The BJP will not give the same support to NUJS that the Left Front gave to NUJS, but I don't think the BJP will interfere as much as Mamata's government did. Let's wait and see.

Yes, there will be more live aarti sessions in the boys' hostel for sure. More yoga day celebrations, and weekly Mann ki Baat live events. The mess will be transformed with veg menus only, with gomutra appetizer, and all cash and credit transactions at Biju's would crash to a halt because of weekly notebandi. Instead of the summer internships, you would have to go for Kumbh shahi snan. And no more late night parties or loitering after hours for the couples, or else the anti-Romeo squad would be after you. As a cherry on top, probably instances of violence directed at the girl students if they dare venture outside their rooms. Also, can't keep a beard or else you will be trucked off to Pakistan (NIFT). Can wear chaddis though.

Yes, he has already made a good start by trying to barge into apartment complexes during the pandemic in order to canvass for votes, without paying heed to restrictions, and subsequently getting chased out of such places by the irate inhabitants. Clearly a display of the progressive education that prompted him to join that party that is hugely responsible for the current abattoir that the country is fast turning into. By the way, can anyone show me a single NLU in the BJP-run states that has shot to fame and glory after BJP has come to power there? If that party was focused on education, then it wouldn't have taken one regressive step after another on a national scale.

Curious to see some of the exit poll forecasts. If there is a change in regime, how will it affect NUJS? The obvious change will be that the EC will be revamped and the two controversial political appointees (law minister and advocate general) will be replaced. But will there be any changes for the good of the institution, or just old wine in a new bottle? Will there be the possibility of more funding and assistance from the centre? Or will there continue to be regressive populist measures like domicile quota and new campuses? Also, what happens to the faculty recruitment, which was suspended due to the elections and has been pending for so many months?

NOTE: Request only people connected with the college to comment.