Cockroach Janta Party’s X account blocked, founder calls it an ‘own goal’ by the government

The X account of satirical political campaign Cockroach Janta Party was on Thursday blocked in India.

The profile was withheld “in response to a legal demand”, the platform said.

The social media campaign, which began on Saturday, describes itself as a “political front of the youth, by the youth, for the youth”.

It was created by Abhijeet Dipke, a 30-year-old political communications strategist from Pune. Dipke has a background in public relations and journalism, and was part of the Aam Aadmi Party’s social media team.

Since it was launched in response to reports of remarks by Chief Justice Surya Kant on Friday comparing some unemployed youngsters to “cockroaches”, the campaign had garnered 13.8 million followers on Instagram as of Thursday afternoon. It was ahead of 8.8 million followers of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party on the platform and 13.3 million of the Congress.

“There are youngsters like cockroaches, who don’t get any employment or have any place in profession,” PTI had quoted Kant as having said. “Some of them become media, some of them become social media, RTI activists and other activists and they start attacking everyone.”

After the X account was withheld on Thursday, Dipke asked in a post on Instagram “why are they so scared of us?”

He asked if the page had been blocked because the campaign had sought the resignation of Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan over the undergraduate National Eligibility cum Entrance Test being cancelled following a paper leak.

However, Dipke said that the blocking of the X account was on expected lines and described it as an “own goal” by the authorities.

Hours later, Dipke said that the campaign had opened a new X account.

The chief justice claimed on Saturday that he had been misquoted by sections of the media and that it was baseless to say that he criticised young people in general. Kant claimed he had specifically criticised “those who have entered professions like the Bar [legal profession] with the aid of fake and bogus degrees”.

Nevertheless, the remarks sparked a social media furore that contributed to the creation and swift rise in popularity of the Cockroach Janta Party.

Three trademark applications filed

Three trademark applications have been filed for the phrase “Cockroach Janta Party”, records from the Trade Marks Registry’s public portal showed on Thursday.

The applications have been filed under Class 45, which cover legal and security services, and certain personal and social services.

Two of the applications were filed by persons identified as Azim Adambhai Jam and Akhand Swaroop. The status for both showed that they had cleared basic administrative and documentary checks.

The third application was filed for a label mark, or to trademark an entire visual design, by an entity identifying itself as the “Cockroach Janta Party”.

The status of the third application reads “send to Vienna codification”, which means the request was to be forwarded to the Vienna Codification branch for further steps in assigning an internationally-recognised code in line with the rules of the Vienna Convention.

Written by Neerad Pandharipande and Sara Varghese. Edited by Nachiket Deuskar.