CJP finds a crowd, but not converts yet in its first big offline test

CJP drew thousands to Jantar Mantar over exam-related concerns, but many supporters remain cautious about embracing the fledgling movement

The barricades were firmly in place. Police deployment began kilometres away. Permission to protest at Jantar Mantar came without much friction, and about 2,000 supporters turned up: The scene in Delhi on June 6 suggested that the first major offline outing of the online GenZ political satire, Cockroach Janata Party (CJP), had grown too large to ignore.  A day later, its founder Abhijeet Dipke raised the stakes, saying it was PM Narendra Modi’s responsibility to secure the resignation of Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan over exam-related lapses. 

The venue carried the movement’s signature aesthetic. Posters reflected internet meme culture, while slogans demanded accountability; cockroach masks and T-shirts set the tone, but banners also invoked B R Ambedkar, Jyotirao Phule and Bhagat Singh. “Students should take the front area, everybody else can take a step back,” Dipke repeatedly told the crowd. 

Dipke — a political communications strategist and student at Boston University — arrived from the airport waving a copy of Ambedkar’s biography. The messaging was clear: Make Gen Z feel like an equal stakeholder in the movement. 

Asked about the next steps, CJP spokesperson Saurav Das said: “This is a leaderless movement and only the thousands of impacted students will decide what will be done next.” Yet Dipke later announced plans to take the protests nationwide and reconvene at Jantar Mantar next Saturday. 

For CJP, the education crisis arrived just as it was positioning itself as a voice for young Indians. Exam leaks are hardly new, said Ankit Lal, political strategist and former head of the Aam Aadmi Party’s social media operations. “But you know, this time, students got a place where they could speak without being labelled anything, and CJP also tapped on the opportunity to get a strong base,” he said. 

Dipke flew in from Boston after calling for demonstrations demanding Pradhan’s resignation over the NEET-UG paper leak and broader concerns about the education system, including issues in CBSE’s on-screen marking mechanism. Young supporters turned up in large numbers. Yet for many, CJP was less a political alternative than a platform to air grievances that directly affect their futures. 

Government exam aspirants, university students and even schoolchildren said they were seeking accountability. “I have been preparing for the UPSC for last three years. I get anxious when I hear cases of exam leaks. My plan B also involves clearing a state government exam,” said Ruchi Verma, a student from Jaipur. 

But enthusiasm for the cause did not necessarily translate into faith in the organisation behind it. “It is too new,” said Vishal Singh, a Delhi University master’s student. “We don’t know anything about them apart from the fact that they are willing to fight for our problems, which is great, but not enough at the moment.” 

Lal drew parallels with the India Against Corruption movement. “Arvind Kejriwal emerged out of it much later. People can come for a cause or a person, and then newer faces can emerge. We are not sure if anything like this will happen here, but at least that was the case then.” 

For now, the crowd at Jantar Mantar suggested that thousands of young Indians are willing to show up for the cause — even if they are not yet ready to sign up for the movement. 

While CJP has largely confined itself to the education issue and avoided discussing political ambitions, politics seeped into the gathering. 

At a press conference on Sunday, Dipke sharpened his attack, arguing that accountability for exam failures ultimately rested with Modi. “If accountability is not getting fixed, it is the responsibility of the Prime Minister Narendra Modi to take the resignation of Dharmendra Pradhan,” he said. “Merely voting once in five years is not politics. People must ask questions to those for whom they have voted.” He added that the agitation would continue until Pradhan stepped down, while insisting that discussions about CJP’s longer-term plans were premature for a movement that is barely 15 days old.

 

Activists from the Students’ Federation of India (SFI) and the All India Students’ Association (AISA) attended and held small parallel meetings within the protest venue. “See, we are here for the cause, but as far as our political preferences are concerned, we have our own party, CPI (ML) Liberation, that is our priority,” said an AISA-affiliated student leader.

 

Other Opposition-aligned student groups, including the Aam Aadmi Party’s Association of Students for Alternative Politics (ASAP) and the Congress-backed National Students’ Union of India, have separately demanded Pradhan’s resignation. Their presence at the protest, however, was largely absent.

 

Beyond the protest site, political lines were already being drawn. Regional parties including the Trinamool Congress, Samajwadi Party, Shiv Sena (UBT) and Left parties backed the movement. The Congress stayed away and largely dismissed it as a “brainchild of Aam Aadmi Party”.