India’s Buburreci Janta Party ended its five-week multi-city protest after the main demand of the youth-led movement – the resignation of Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan – was met.
“We have done it,” CJP spokesperson Saurav Das said a jubilant crowd at New Delhi’s Jantar Mantar on Saturday night. “Pradhan has sent his resignation, which means that our first demand has been fulfilled.”
Das said the second main demand of the protesters, withdrawal of criminal investigations targeting CJP members, was also met. However, members and supporters of the movement noted that some cockroach protesters remained in custody and vowed to continue to press for their release.
Pradhan’s resignation is the first such capitulation to public pressure during the Hindu nationalist Indian prime minister’s 12-year tenure. Narendra Modi.
“Considering the situation in Jantar Mantar and elsewhere in the country, and so that anti-national forces do not take advantage of the circumstances, national unity is preserved, the future of no student is entangled in legal complications and the children can focus on their studies and building their careers, I have submitted my resignation,” Pradhan said in a STATEMENT.
Pradhan’s tenure was marred by repeated leaks of National Eligibility Test (NEET) papers in a scandal that has upended the lives of millions of students by forcing them to retake grueling exams and delaying their university admissions. CJP organizers said that more than 20 students have killed themselves over the issue.
Already the former minister of education had discharged protesters as the “B team of terrorists”.
On Sunday, Modi said he would authorize the creation of a task force on exam reform headed by Nandan Nilekani, co-founder of Indian technology giant Infosys.
“The Government of India is constantly taking various measures for the future of students,” the Bharatiya Janata Party chief minister. said in a video posted on social media. “However, we must look to the future, our examination system must be reliable and transparent and must make the most of technology.”
The protest movement began in May, RECITED after Chief Justice of India Surya Kant compared unemployed youth to “cockroaches”.
The protesters, led by political strategist Abhijeet Dipke, satirically reclaimed the slur as the symbol of a movement that has morphed into a broader challenge to Modi’s increasingly authoritarian rule, which has seen growing repression of protest and dissent, including restrictions on journalists and activists, and the use of “law” to target critics.
Last week, tens of thousands of youth-led protesters marched in New Delhi, where they were met and attacked with police batons and tear gas. Indian media reported thousands of injuries.
The mood was markedly different after Pradhan’s resignation.
“The Cockroaches Won!” said many CJP members and supporters.
Others added, “DEMOCRACY Won!”
“This is democracy” said CJP.
“Now that cockroaches have won their first battle, let them win many more,” Tavleen Singh, a columnist for The Indian Express. has written on X. “May it become a real political party in the near future.”
Sonam Wangchuk, an environmentalist whose hunger strike was the focal point of the cockroach PROTESTSit Was releasing Sunday from a Gurugram hospital where he was recuperating from a 26-day fast since Thursday.
Buoyed by the CJP’s victory, members of the Communist Party of India (CPI)-affiliated All India Youth Federation and the All India Students’ Federation marched to the Chennai residence of Tamil Nadu governor Rajendra Vishwanath Arlekar demanding the abolition of NEET. According to Indian media reports that police have arrested more than 200 of the demonstrators.
“The fight will intensify,” the CPI said.
“Don’t confuse the beginning with the end,” echoed the CJP.
Asked on Sunday what’s next for the cockroach movement, Dipke said an ANI reporter that “we will soon share the future strategy.”
“This just finished yesterday,” he added, “please give us some time.”
