How the ‘cockroaches’ at the Jantar Mantar sit-in are keeping themselves busy

Tanya Thakur makes her way to Delhi’s Jantar Mantar every night.

The 17-year-old distributes water bottles among the protestors camping there to ask for the resignation of Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan. She picks up trash left behind by other visitors.

When not performing these duties, she borrows books to read from the stalls set up by left-wing student outfits or chats with other young protestors.

“I worry that if I don’t come one day, others will also stop coming and the site will be empty,” she said.

Thakur recently finished her school education in Himachal Pradesh. An aspiring chef, she came to stay with her sister in Delhi because she was keen to take part in the protest organised by the Cockroach Janta Party.

The fledgling outfit started as a satirical social media campaign but has now organised protests in at least eight major Indian cities. It draws its support mostly from young people angry with the Modi government for repeatedly failing to hold examinations for medical college seats and government jobs in a secure manner.

It first staged a protest on June 6 at Jantar Mantar in New Delhi. Then, on June 20, its leaders decided to turn its second protest in the city into a sit-in. Since then, around 150 protestors, many of whom have travelled from distant cities, can be found at the site at any time.

Scroll visited Jantar Mantar over several days to speak to the young protestors and find out why they felt so invested in the protest and how they were keeping it going.

‘A lot of fun’

Thakur, known to her friends as Rosie, said that she was drawn to the campaign because her close friends had been affected by recent instances of paper leaks.

“My friend came to Kullu all the way from Chandigarh to sit for the NEET [National Eligibility cum Entrance Test] exam,” she recalled. “I felt really bad for her when her paper leaked out and the exam was cancelled.”

So, she joined the protest to raise her voice against what she sees as corruption on the part of the government. Not that she had any hopes from opposition parties, she added.

Thakur began volunteering at the site from the first night itself. She is among the handful of women who spend the night at the sit-in.

She shows up at the protest site after sunset every day and leaves for her sister’s home in the southern neighbourhood of Malviya Nagar around daybreak. She said that she felt safe at the protest, where the nights are anything but dull.

“Something or the other is always going on here,” she pointed out. “Seeing people sing protest songs is a lot of fun. We don’t have all this in Himachal Pradesh. I had only heard of comrades before this.”

Vivek Kumar, 19, concurred. Even though there is no dearth of left-wing activists in Bihar, where he comes from, his own circumstances had kept him away from university politics.

Kumar wanted to become an engineer, but a health condition left his father incapacitated and he had to step up to the task of providing for his parents and younger brother. For the past year, he has taken up several different jobs in Noida and Gurugram. He also drives a motorbike taxi at night to supplement his income.

However, since the Cockroach Janta Party sit-in began on June 20, Kumar has been camping at Jantar Mantar. “I could not continue my studies so I know the value of education,” he said. “Students from poor families take loans to study. They are worst affected by paper leaks. I have come here for them.”

Although he was losing out on work and wages, Kumar was not too worried. Supporters of the campaign show up every day with food for the protestors. For a shower, he walks down to the nearby Bangla Sahib Gurudwara, which is 800 metres away. When he suffered a finger injury recently, a doctor present on the spot treated it immediately.

For Kumar, being at the protest was itself proving to be an education. “I am learning a lot from talking to the arts students here,” he said. “They think very deeply about everything and respond to arguments calmly. I am not like this.”

The experience has inspired Kumar to start his own political party in the future. “I am treating it like a course for becoming a politician,” he stated. He, too, borrows books from the stalls at the site. The books he has read so far were about Bhagat Singh, Mohandas Gandhi and Bhimrao Ambedkar, he added.

Recording reels, making history

Not everybody supporting the cause is immersed in reading. Mohammed Faizan Siddiqui, a 22-year-old filmmaker, has been making short videos about his time at Jantar Mantar ever since the Cockroach Janta Party held its first protest in Delhi.

When the organisers noticed that his videos were being viewed by lakhs of people online, they gave him access to the stage and the campaign’s founder, Abhijeet Dipke. He now puts out several videos of himself bantering with Dipke every day in addition to the updates that organisers want him to share with his audience on social media.

“I had been waiting for an initiative like this for a while,” said Siddiqui. “I knew I could make it go viral on social media because everybody knows that what is happening in this country is very wrong. Hindus and Muslims are being divided in the name of religion.”

Siddiqui dismissed criticism that the campaign was overly focused on social media, arguing that it was the only way for it to reach the masses. “The news channels are not showing us on TV at all,” he complained.

He boasted that supporters from far-off cities had joined the sit-in after watching his videos, adding that he had made several new friends there over the last two weeks.

“We have fun together here,” Siddiqui explained. “We play chess and UNO [card game]. This is like our home now. If we succeed in this struggle, we will be able to brag about it years later.”

Ruchith Asha Kamal, 21, also framed his participation in the protest in similar historical terms. He had come from Hyderabad to extend his support to the campaign because his younger sister was affected by the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test paper leak in May. Before he came to Delhi, he had helped the Cockroach Janta Party organise a gathering in his home city too.

“I love movements, I love to see people resisting,” the law student and budding environmental activist said. “Whether this becomes a wave or not, we will continue to organise people. For me, looking at this is an education in how patterns come and go.”

Questions that loom

Older protestors at the site were less buoyant.

Durgesh Kuhike, a 28-year-old actor who owns a mobile phone shop in Nagpur, came for the sit-in with three sets of clothes and a pair of crocs. The first time Scroll met him on June 22, he claimed that he was prepared to stay in Jantar Mantar for up to two weeks. But five days later, he was preparing to return home.

“My mother is not well,” Kuhike explained, adding that he would come back in a few days if the protest continues.

“Do you know if the cabinet reshuffle is happening?” he asked, echoing widespread speculation that Prime Minister Narendra Modi is going to make significant changes in the composition of his government.

“We will have nothing left to say if Pradhan is removed from the education ministry,” Kuhike said. If the education minister was given another portfolio, their protest would have made no difference, he contended.

Should they be asking for Pradhan to be dropped from the cabinet altogether? Or should they be demanding more substantial interventions that lead to systemic change? Those were the questions bothering him.

Others shared his disquiet.

Sheetal Choudhary, 29, teaches at a school in Ghaziabad. She came to the protest with her partner, Saurabh Yadav, who is a lawyer by profession. Both of them expressed concern that left activists had “hijacked” the sit-in and were using it as an opportunity to promote their outfits.

“They should rise above these organisational considerations for the sake of making this a people’s movement,” Yadav argued.

Choudhary had personally suffered on account of paper leaks and delays. A recruitment drive for teachers in Delhi that she took part in three years ago wound up only earlier this year.

“Our presence here is important to keep the organisers motivated,” she said.

But, like Kuhike, she wondered what would become of their efforts if Pradhan was shifted to another ministry or dropped from the Modi cabinet. “Will it be considered our victory?” she asked.

With questions such as these looming over it, the sit-in continues for now.