India’s Cockroach protesters halt Delhi marches after clashes

Leaders of India’s youth-led “cockroach” protest movement said they will stop marching through New Delhi after police used tear gas and batons against demonstrators trying to reach parliament, but vowed to continue their campaign for education reforms and the resignation of Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan.

“We will not march again because the police will hurt the youth again,” Cockroach Janta Party founder Abhijeet Dipke told a news conference Tuesday.

The decision followed a turbulent Monday in central Delhi, where more than 10,000 protesters, according to Al Jazeera, and tens of thousands, according to the BBC, defied a police ban and tried to march on parliament on the opening day of the monsoon session. Police fired tear gas, used batons and cleared the movement’s main protest site at Jantar Mantar, where demonstrators had been camped for about a month.

The CJP said 150 protesters were wounded. Delhi police said nearly 180 people were injured, including 60 protesters and 118 police and security personnel. Police said 70 protesters were detained and that legal action would be initiated against them.

Police accused protesters of “unruly, aggressive and violent behaviour,” saying they attacked officers with stones and other objects, tried to breach barricades, vandalised vehicles, damaged public property and resorted to “large-scale violence.” The CJP rejected that account and accused police of being the aggressors. Multiple videos of the clashes showed police attacking protesters, Al Jazeera reported, while no footage had emerged of violence by marchers.

Police and Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government have not commented on the use of sticks and tear gas against protesters, the BBC reported. Amnesty International said the police action showed “how peaceful dissent is being suppressed in India.”

“They beat us black and blue, and they damaged our protest site,” Sahil Singh, a protester from Uttar Pradesh, told Reuters. “We want accountability to be set with Pradhan’s resignation.”

The CJP is demanding an overhaul of India’s education system and greater accountability over exam paper leaks. Its central demand is Pradhan’s resignation after the leak of the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test, or NEET. Nearly 2.28 million candidates sat the medical entrance exam on May 3, according to the BBC; Al Jazeera reported that 2.2 million aspiring doctors were forced to retake exams after the leak.

The CJP says families of students who died by suicide after the scandal should receive compensation of 10 million rupees, or about $104,000, each. Al Jazeera reported at least 12 such deaths, while the BBC said more than 20 students had died by suicide, with families saying they were devastated by the scandal.

“We won’t stop. Pradhan has to be sacked,” CJP leader Ashutosh Ranka said.

The movement began online with satirical memes mocking the government and grew rapidly on social media before drawing large crowds to the streets. It took its name after India’s chief justice used the word “cockroach” to describe some unemployed young people turning to journalism and activism; after criticism, he said he had referred only to those with “fake and bogus degrees.”

The protests gained further attention after 59-year-old activist and educationist Sonam Wangchuk joined the campaign on June 28 and began an indefinite hunger strike. He was forcibly removed by police on Saturday and taken to hospital, where the BBC reported he continued to fast. On Tuesday, the Delhi High Court ruled Wangchuk could be moved from a government hospital to a private healthcare facility after his wife alleged he was being held in “illegal detention,” the legal news website Bar and Bench reported.

Opposition leader Rahul Gandhi and his sister Priyanka joined members of the Indian National Congress in a protest outside Modi’s house Tuesday. “We have marched to PM Modi’s house to demand answers from him for the brutalities against young students yesterday,” Gandhi posted on X. He also called the students’ demands “legitimate” and said Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah “must resign for destroying the future of India’s youth.”

Health Minister JP Nadda met CJP leaders Monday and said the meeting was cordial. “I have requested all the protesters to end their sit-in and assist the administration in restoring normalcy,” he said. CJP spokesperson Saurav Das said the group received a promise that the government would look into the matter but no concrete assurances. Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju said Tuesday, “I think when the talks are going on in a right direction, the atmosphere should not be vitiated.”