SUC Report Card(2021-22): Krishna Prajwal
Written on June 17th, 2022 by {"login"=>"jcbphc21", "email"=>"f20181005@hyderabad.bits-pilani.ac.in", "display_name"=>"Journal Club, BPHC", "first_name"=>"Journal Club", "last_name"=>"BPHC"}Krishna Prajwal, the President of the Student Union Council of BPHC, has put forth a 19-point manifesto prior to the elections. Of these 19 points that ranged from improving the tech culture, conducting fests, and implementing multiple student programs, 7 were fulfilled, 5 were partially fulfilled or in progress, and 7 were not fulfilled. You can find his manifesto here.
- Covid Vaccination Drive and Campus Reopening: Fulfilled
Organized all the vaccination drives, from collecting data of the unvaccinated people, sorting as per the dates, enquiring about the vaccine availability at the center, speaking with the officials, deciding about the dates of drives, and dealing with all the hassles at the center from the side of officials, taking people to the center, etc.
The promise of reopening the campus by the President in his manifesto was also fulfilled accompanied by the improvement in the COVID-19 wave.
- Mental Health: Unfulfilled
It was stated in the manifesto that the President will give utmost importance to mental health and work on the betterment of such facilities for students. But it seems that over the course of one year, the only thing the Council has done for mental health is by holding three talks during the Mental Health Awareness Week in 2022. The manifesto also stated that an anonymous portal will be created for students to share their problems – no such portal has come into existence, nor have any efforts been made to do the same.
The President told us that the Students’ Union let go of this project and surrendered it to M Power which they believed could do a better job than them in this situation.
- SU Portal: In progress
The manifesto contains the promise of an SU Portal that would function as a hub of departmental and club activity on campus. It would include tabs that inform students of various club activities, inductions, etc. Journal Club talked to a source inside this team who stated that the basic design templates for the portal were created in the first few weeks, but the work soon slowed and died down.
The President posted an induction notice for a team to work on this portal; four days after he won the election. After that, there has been radio silence regarding this - both on Facebook and E-Mail.
As of writing this article, no SU portal has been created. In response, the President told us the following,
“Everything to create the portal is ready. As soon as we get some content then the next SUC can finish the job.”
- SU Team: Fulfilled
Almost every SU for the past two years has had a tech team to help it build a portal – all attempts have ended in failure. The SU did induct a team to create the portal, but the work was soon halted.
The President has come forth and shared that management teams were formed to help with certain events like the Diwali celebration on campus etc. This team was made up of 9 to 12 members. The same SUC management was also responsible for helping the SUC reach out to the general body and act as a bridge between the GB and SU.
- Transparent SUC: In progress
Since the SU portal was never made, it rules out the possibility of making a separate tab for making the transactions available. However, little effort has been made by the President to make the transactions available via other media. Questions raised about the distribution and expenditure from the SU funds remained unanswered.
To justify this, the President stated that there were no transactions done except the fest and thus they did not share them. The other transactions, according to him, can be verified by CRC and will be released by CRC. If the transparency of funds is in the hands of CRC, then maybe this isn’t a point that belongs in his manifesto? The question of transparency cannot be verified until CRC releases the transactions.
- Accountability Meets: Unfulfilled
The President made a promise that meets will be organized in regular intervals where the GB can join and ask questions related to the functioning of the SUC. However such meets were not organized. The only time the President was open to questions from the GB was during the GBM organized for passing the fest’s budget, and even then many questions went unanswered. Various questions were asked by the GB on public platforms which were neither channelized nor answered.
The President justified this by stating that the Council held accountability meets during Campus reopening and Mess issues. But it begs the question, why weren’t these meets held for other topics like the SU Merch, the Comedy Proshow Fiasco, etc. ? Also in the meets the President claims to be accountability meets, only partial updates on the covid situation on campus were given an indefinite silence on the plans forward or the actual stats were given during the meet, which cannot be labeled as accountability.
- Conduction of Fest: In Progress
The President, in his manifesto, mentioned that he would try to pursue the conduction of either online or offline fest depending on the circumstances. He also stated that the Students’ Union Funds “shall be put to good use without any wastage.”
The expenditure for Orbe Novo has not been released yet. Still, it truly makes one ask the question – Was the SUF actually used judicially, and was student interest taken into account while making the budget?
As for the fest, many students complained about false promises for certain comedy pro shows. One day before the act, it was declared that early entry would be granted to those having a certain ‘ticket’ that could be purchased for free on the SWD Portal. Gross seating mismanagement occurred during the show, causing a lot of attendees to be stranded outside.
Proper publicity of many events was not carried out and it was extremely hard to find an accurate schedule that would help the students to attend the different event
The President did end up conducting a fest with some successful events – such as Bollywood and Band Night. But whether these small, isolated successes can outweigh the overall gross negligence of the SU under the President’s leadership is up to the reader to decide. As of now, we’re still not aware if the SUF was put to good use and have to wait until CRC releases the actual numbers.
- Online Courses: In Progress
The SU negotiated a yearly two-course subscription from Coursera after the previous subscription ended. It seems that the Council has also tried to explore platforms but didn’t get a positive response from the platforms.
- E-Scooters: Unfulfilled
The president made a proposal that paid electric scooters can be provided to the students with a minimal fee. It seems that after being elected they did create a plan and submit it to the administration but it was rejected/stalled. So this has also turned out to be another promise that was never fulfilled. The President stated that they have spoken to vendors and a few test trials were done. However, sources told us that these test trials were a launchpad initiative, not the SUC’s
- Batch Representatives: Fulfilled
The President stated in his manifesto that to ease out the communication between the various batches on campus and the SUC, batch representatives will be appointed.
Batch representatives were appointed for the academic year 2021-22 by the SUC and although these roles haven’t been constitutionally defined yet, the representatives took responsibility to communicate any issues from their respective batches to the SUC.
- Sophomore Support Program: Fulfilled
As promised, the 2020 students were told to fill out forms stating their interests, and then they were allotted mentors from the third year based on the same. However, it failed to achieve its purpose as there was not much interaction between the mentors and their mentees.
- Revamping Fresher’s Guidance Program: Unfulfilled
A promise of circulating feedback forms for freshers was mentioned in the manifesto. The idea was that these feedback forms would allow the juniors who had inactive mentors to be reallotted if they submitted their grievances.
No such form was circulated, and FGP continued like last year.
The Council also stated that they had matched the mentors and their mentees according to branch and interests but a number of students have argued that this is not true as they have been given freshers with completely different branches and interests.
- Fervour: Unfulfilled
The president promised in his manifesto that Fervour will be conducted after the entire batch of freshers only after they arrive on campus. While their arrival did get postponed due to unfortunate covid circumstances, Fervour was conducted before the admission process was complete for the 2021 batch due to which a huge portion of the 21 batch did not get to attend Fervour.
- Interaction with Higher Degree Students: Fulfilled
Frequent interactive sessions with the Higher Degree students were promised to be conducted by the SUC in the President’s manifesto in order to a better understanding of issues they face and to ensure their participation in various campus activities.
The SU tried to promote inclusivity with the higher degree students by inviting them to join Free Expression Group and Shoutbox on Facebook. The President also pointed out the increased participation of HD students in Sports activity as a sign of increased higher degree incorporation.
- Cultural week: Unfulfilled
The President stated that a Cultural week will be conducted similar to Tech Week where various cultural clubs can perform and showcase their talents. However, the proposed Cultural week was never spoken about again or initiated.
Adding on to this the President said that Cultural nights will be planned once a month and a club would take responsibility and volunteer to showcase their skills. These events along with other events conducted by the cultural senate will be promoted by the SUC through the SUC portal. The Cultural nights never took place and neither was the SUC portal completed to aid the promotion of any events conducted by the Cultural senate.
In conversation with us, the President stated that these things could not be achieved because the SUC never got permission from the administration to use the auditorium. But it stands to question why they could not conduct these events at another public venue on campus. He also stated that it took the Council a long time to relax the COVID restrictions, so they couldn’t organize it.
- Mindstorms - Tech Week: Fulfilled
The promise for conducting a Tech week in the President’s manifesto was fulfilled at the beginning of February this year.
While the Tech week wasn’t called Mindstorms and did not have any hackathons with campus-relevant real-life problems, it was conducted successfully in collaboration with the Tech Senate in online mode with many engaging tech-savvy events. Despite being online, Tech Week managed to garner significant participation from the GB.
- SUC Bodies Workshop: Unfulfilled
Paid workshops and events by the cultural and sports bodies of the SUC were promised to be conducted by the President in his Manifesto and the profits made by these were to be used as additional funding for activities in both the cultural and sports senate. However, no such workshops or events were conducted by either the sports or cultural senate.
- Workspace and Equipment for Tech Teams: In progress
The President stated in his manifesto that he would “convince the administration to provide dedicated workspaces for tech teams on campus with upgraded equipment.” The Journal Club was in contact with two members who were involved in different tech clubs and teams. Both seemed to agree that the SU has not provided any support to the tech teams. No new dedicated space has been allocated to the team members. The clubs have ordered new equipment, but this was done on behalf of I-Cell, and the SU was not involved. However, in the beginning, the President claimed that he was the one who talked to the Mechanical Engineering Department to send the proposal to I-Cell which allowed them to get the tools.
The sources also state that some funds have been given as a result of the SUTC (Students’ Union Tech Challenge). There have also been talks about a ‘workshop equipment budget’ but these seemed to have produced no purchases.
- SUTC: Fulfilled
The SUTC was promised to be revamped every semester by the President in his manifesto. While it wasn’t conducted every semester, the SUTC has been revamped and conducted once this academic year. Under this initiative, SUC provided funding for various technical activities undertaken by first-degree students.
Multiple projects by first-degree students were approved and provided with funding as and when the projects progressed under this initiative. The funding was also increased from 1.7 to 4 Lakhs.