Shimla: Gender consideration played no part in her historic victory, asserted Shikha Chauhan, the first woman to be elected president of the students' union in Himachal Pradesh University (HPU).

Shikha Chauhan of the Left-backed Student Federation of India (SFI) won the president's post of the Students' Central Association on Thursday to become the first woman to be elected to the post in the 30-year history of the state university.

Chauhan defeated Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) candidate Amit Kumar by a margin of 47 votes.

A law student, Shikha felt there was no gender consideration in her election as president.

"Of course, there was no gender consideration. It is my ideology and style of working that gave me a chance to fight for the cause of students," she told sources.

Her top priorities would be to fight against commercialisation of education and to make the university a profit-making entity.

The SFI again dominated the university elections by winning three of the four executive posts in the students body.

Though the communists have no stake in the state politics, they have been dominating the HPU student polls for over five years.

The posts of secretary and joint secretary were won by SFI candidates, Virender Singh and Surinder Kumar.

Daleep Negi of the ABVP was elected vice-president.

With 73 per cent polling in HPU, a total of 1,882 out of 2,574 students cast their votes. IANS