A year after having made a splash in Patna University Students' Union polls, the students' wing of Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar's Janata Dal (United) bit the dust on Sunday failing to win any of the key posts, while RSS affiliate ABVP came up with a diminished performance, holding on to only the general secretary's post.
Last year, the Chhatra JD(U) had bagged the posts of president and treasurer while the ABVP's Priyanka Srivastava had won general secretary's post which she has retained for the outfit even as its candidates lost the battle for vice president and joint secretary.
The student wing of Jan Adhikar Party (JAP), a fledgling outfit floated by former Madhepura MP Rajesh Ranjan alias Pappu Yadav and backed by the Leftist AISF, came out with a stunning performance as its candidates Manish Kumar and Amir Raza were elected as president and joint secretary.
Ultra-left AISA made a comeback of sorts as Komal Kumari, fighting for the post of the treasurer, emerged victorious.
Nishant Kumar, the candidate of Chhatra RJD - students' wing of Lalu Prasad's party - bagged the vice president's post.
Pappu Yadav, left high and dry since his defeat in the Lok Sabha polls held this year, rejoiced at the victory of his candidates and remarked on his official twitter handle, "This is not just a victory but a huge responsibility. We dedicate our success to mathematician Vashishth Narayan Singh".
Singh, who died last month after spending years in penury and fighting mental illness, was an alumnus of the Patna University.
The Bihar BJP sought to downplay the poor show of the ABVP, which came less than a year before assembly elections are scheduled in the state.
"The ABVP is not a student organization of the BJP, but ideologically we correlate with each other.Congratulations to all winners and participants," party spokesman Nikhil Anand tweeted.
A studied silence was maintained over the results by the chief minister's party, in contrast with the jubilations that had erupted following Chhatra JD(U)'s stunning victory last year, which had caused bad blood between the party as well as its alliance partner BJP.
A visit to the vice-chancellor's office, just ahead of the elections, by poll strategist-turned- JD(U) national vice president Prashant Kishor had triggered a major controversy and ABVP supporters had pelted his vehicle with stones alleging that he was trying to influence the student body elections.
After some ABVP leaders were rounded up by police in connection with the attack on the car, a delegation of BJP MLAs had rushed to the Raj Bhavan late in the night before staging a dharna in front of the police station concerned, which was discontinued only after the detained student activists were let off.
