Just at this moment in history, it would appear, it is India’s turn
How does this brutality and coercion square up with Amartya Sen’s vision for Gen Z and young activists, where he defines democracy not just as the act of voting, but as the ongoing exercise of "public reasoning"—meaning social justice is achieved by actively speaking up, protesting, and forcing dialogue?
By Ranjit Bhushan in Delhi
``The argumentative tradition can be a strong ally of the underdog, particularly in the context of democratic practice… voices of dissent – social as well as philosophical – have often come across barriers of caste, class and gender, and they have not been entirely ineffective’’
Amartya Sen in ‘The Argumentative Indian’
The famed counterculture of the 1960s, a youth movement steeped in eclectic and diverse mores, was an anti-establishment cultural phenomenon and political movement that developed in the West from the mid-1960s to the early 1970s.
It represented a mass rejection of post-war social complacency, authoritarian academic and political structures, and traditional moral codes.
Five decades down the line, the names have changed – from the 1960’s counter-culture heroes like Daniel Cohn-Bendit and John Lewis to modern-day youth icons, Greta Thunberg and Malala Yousafzai -- but the essential themes continue to resonate, from one generation to the next.
Just at this moment in history, it would appear, it is India’s turn.
Today’s youth movement activists, best known by their nom de guerre Cockroach Janata Party (CJP), have caught the country’s imagination. They are widely recognized as eclectic, diverse, liberal, and democratic, reflecting the complex socio-political landscape of modern India.
The CJP has shaken up India's political landscape by transitioning from a viral, Gen Z-led internet meme with almost 26 million followers in days, into a powerful grassroots force. Founded on May 16, 2026, by digital communications strategist Abhijeet Dipke, the CJP emerged as a satirical response after Chief Justice of India Surya Kant made a controversial remark in open court comparing critical, unemployed youth to "cockroaches".
Reclaiming the insult, millions of young Indians rallied under the slogan "Main Bhi Cockroach" ("I am also a cockroach"), rapidly turning the CJP's social media platforms into spaces with follower counts that eclipsed traditional major parties, including the ruling party in Delhi.
The CJP has shifted away from rigid, singular ideologies toward intersectional networks that champion constitutional rights, civil liberties, and democratic values.
In his celebrated book The Argumentative Indian, Amartya Sen argues that India’s deeply rooted history of public debate, intellectual scepticism, and pluralism is essential for modern youth to challenge social inequality and champion social justice. He contends that India's long history of robust public debate and intellectual heterodoxy is not just an academic curiosity, but a vital political tool for contemporary social justice.
``Some of the most powerful arguments in Indian intellectual history have, in fact, been about the lives of the least privileged groups, which have drawn on the substantive forces of these claims, rather than on the cultivated brilliance of well-trained dialectics,’’ he writes in his book, a collection of brilliant essays, first published in 2005 that is now regarded as a modern-day classic. The essays are as relevant in 2026, and will continue to remain so, as they were when they were published.
Rather than viewing democracy as a recent Western import, Sen demonstrates that the tradition of open dialogue has thrived in India for millennia, providing a powerful cultural blueprint for political engagement today.
India has been especially fortunate in having a long tradition of public arguments, with toleration and intellectual heterodoxy, Sen notes, observing, ``When more than half-a century ago, independent India became the first country in the non-western world to choose a resolutely democratic Constitution, it not only used what it had learnt from the institutional experience in Europe and America (particularly Great Britain), it also drew on its own tradition of public reasoning and argumentative heterodoxy.’’
As the raging youth movement in contemporary India demonstrates, activists belong to a vast spectrum of socio-economic backgrounds, regions, castes, and identities. Rather than rallies being organized by a single political party, movements frequently blend issues like Dalit rights, tribal land sovereignty, fundamental rights, freedom of expression and dissent, LGBTQ+ equality, and climate action under shared banners.
A central theme in modern Indian youth protests is a fierce defence of the Indian Constitution. Activists heavily utilize democratic tools—such as peaceful assemblies, public interest litigations (PILs), and digital advocacy—to demand transparency, free speech, and secularism.
Neha Bora, president of All India Students' Association (AISA), and one of the leading lights of India’s current youth agitation, said the youth protests were aimed at seeking accountability from an individual and an institution that were expected to protect democratic processes. ``People would continue to raise questions over democracy, electoral rolls and the right to protest,’’ she has reiterated, steadfastly.
Given that the world today operates on a global digital foundation that connects over 5.56 billion internet users, young activists have used platforms like Instagram, X (formerly Twitter), and independent digital journalism to bypass what is widely perceived to be compromised mainstream media. This allows them to raise immediate awareness on human rights, gender discrimination, education, and localized environmental issues.
Just what are the tactile outcomes of India’s rebellious movement?
Some analysts, particularly those writing for independent outlets, argue that decentralized, internet-native student mobilizations such as the CJP have successfully challenged the perceived invulnerability of the ruling Narendra Modi-led BJP government.
Proponents point to tangible political outcomes, notably forcing the resignation of Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan in July 2026 following massive protests over NEET entrance exam leaks. Observers claim that the ability of young citizens to bypass mainstream media control via viral social media content, and to continuously return to the streets despite brutal police crackdowns and thousands of preventive detentions, demonstrates a significant erosion of State-induced fear.
Predictably, representatives from the BJP dismiss the street agitations as the work of "anarchic elements" and political adversaries. The government maintains that the protests are politically motivated campaigns engineered in concert with opposition parties, rather than organic student uprisings.
Officials defend the strict security measures, huge contingents of para military forces, internet suspensions, train and metro cancellations, and pre-emptive ‘inside the flight’ detentions of CJP leaders implemented in New Delhi as necessary protocols to preserve public order and counter unauthorized mass gatherings, going so far as to point the finger at `foreign’ elements and `anti-nationals’ conspiring to scuttle India’s rise.
Then there are those socio-political researchers, who emphasize that while youth discontent over systemic failures—like paper leaks, forged voter lists, and job scarcity—is acute, it does not easily translate into a unified national revolution.
On October 10 last week, Indian authorities deployed a sweeping security crackdown across New Delhi and detained thousands of protesters belonging to the Cockroach movement that sought to intensify a nationwide campaign against a contentious voter list revision or Special Intensive Revision (SIR), which has fuelled widespread anger at Modi’s BJP and central election authorities. It has been reported that as many as 13 crore voter names have been deleted across the nation.
Police moved to break up the peaceful protest before it could begin, intercepting agitators on their way to Jantar Mantar, the designated protest site in the heart of India’s capital, which was subsequently de-notified as a place to launch agitations and sit-ins. Some were dragged away before being bundled into police vehicles and taken to temporary detention centres. Several Cockroach movement leaders, opposition lawmakers and student activists were detained before arriving, effectively crippling the protest ahead of its start. Even some journalists were arrested, and their equipment seized.
“The pre-planned interception by Delhi Police aims to cripple the leadership of today’s peaceful demonstrations before they even reach the protest site,” the movement said in a statement.
How does this brutality and coercion square up with Sen’s vision for young activists, where he defines democracy not just as the act of voting, but as the ongoing exercise of "public reasoning"—meaning social justice is achieved by actively speaking up, protesting, and forcing dialogue?
The world-famous economist and philosopher notes in his preface to the book: ``India is an immensely diverse country with many distinct pursuits, vastly disparate convictions, widely divergent customs and a veritable feast of viewpoints.’’
The Vedas, Sen writes, may be full of hymns and religious invocations, but they also tell stories, speculate about the world and ask difficult questions. ``Who really knows? Who will here proclaim? Whence was it produced? Whence is this creation?...perhaps it formed itself, or perhaps it did not – the one who looks down on it, in the highest heaven, only he knows – or perhaps he does not know.’’
Indeed, the attempts at veritably crushing dissent in India today, comes as a strong counterpoint to the central thesis expounded in the fabled Hindu scriptures. That is why, as Gen Z rocks the repressive establishment's fledgling boat, it's time to visit Amartya Sen's classic, 'The Argumentative Indian', once again.
Based in Delhi, Ranjit Bhushan is a seasoned journalist who has worked for over three decades across the mainstream English media, including in Outlook, The Times of India, The Indian Express, the Press Trust of India (PTI), Associated Press (AP), Financial Chronicle, and DNA. He is the author of ‘Maoism in India and Nepal’ .
Lead image: courtesy of Cockroach Janta Party