New Delhi:
Aishe Ghosh, the chief of the students’ union of the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), will contest the assembly election in West Bengal as a CPI (M) candidate. She is the first sitting president of JNU’s students’ union to contest in an assembly election.
The CPI (M) has given Ms Ghosh the Jamuria seat to contest from. She will be backed by the Sanyukt Morcha.
“Will be contesting from Jamuria Legislative Assembly Seat as candidate of the CPI(M) ,supported by the Sanyukt Morcha.Requesting all of your support,” she tweeted this morning.
Elections to 294-member West Bengal assembly will be held in eight phases starting from March 27 with the final round of voting taking place on April 29. The counting of votes will take place on May 2.
The Left and the Congress are fighting the Bengal election jointly, along with the Indian Secular Front or ISF. While the Left Front announced the names of candidates for the first two phases on March 5, it came up with the names for most seats allotted to it for the remaining six phases on Wednesday.
Aishe Ghosh was badly injured in a brutal attack on students and teachers on the JNU campus in January last year. The sight of Ms Ghosh with blood streaming down her face became the defining image of the JNU violence when close to 70 people, their faces masked, entered the campus with sledgehammers, iron rods and glass bottles, and beat students and teachers.
The violence on the university campus made headlines, triggering protests across the country.
Kanhaiya Kumar, also a former JNU students’ union chief, had contested the 2019 Lok Sabha election from Bihar’s Begusarai as a Left candidate. He he lost to Union Minister and BJP leader Giriraj Singh by a massive margin.