▲ Protesters celebrate the resignation of Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan in New Delhi on the 25th (local time).
The "Cockroach Janata Party" (CJP), a Gen Z organization in India that has been staging protests against medical school entrance exam question leaks, has ended its month-long demonstrations after the government accepted all of its demands.
According to Reuters, AP, and AFP reports on the 26th local time, government representatives including Indian Health and Family Welfare Minister Jagat Prakash Nadda and CJP leaders held a joint press conference following a meeting the previous day, announcing that the government had agreed to all of the CJP's demands.
Ashutosh Lanka, a CJP spokesperson, stated, "The conclusion is that we have won," adding, "As all the demands raised by our team have been accepted, we ask all protesters to call off the demonstrations and return home peacefully."
The CJP had demanded the resignation of Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan, who was held responsible for the question leak scandal, along with reforms to the medical school entrance exam system, compensation for the bereaved families of test-takers who took their own lives in connection with the leaks, and a halt to legal actions against protesters.
With Minister Pradhan stepping down the previous day and core demands thus met, the CJP declared victory.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi accepted Minister Pradhan's resignation and appointed Pralhad Joshi, who currently serves concurrently as Minister of New and Renewable Energy and Minister of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution, as the new Education Minister.
Thousands of CJP protesters, who had gathered at Jantar Mantar, a government-designated protest site in downtown New Delhi, chanted slogans and distributed sweets to celebrate their victory upon hearing the news of Minister Pradhan's resignation.
Abhijit Dipke (30), the founder of the CJP, declared amidst the cheers of the protesters, "We did it."
Sonam Wangchuk (59), a prominent environmental and educational activist who staged a 26-day hunger strike in support of the CJP, also wrote on X (formerly Twitter) that Minister Pradhan's resignation is "a victory of peace, patience, and perseverance."
Opposition leader Rahul Gandhi of the Indian National Congress (INC) called Minister Pradhan's resignation "a significant step forward toward reforming the education system," and urged Prime Minister Modi to apologize to students and young people and show them respect.
Earlier in May, following controversies over question leaks and poor management in the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) for medical school admissions, which was taken by about 2.2 million people, 10 test-takers reportedly took their own lives after failing to withstand the pressure for re-examination.
In response, the CJP was founded that same month, satirizing a remark by Indian Supreme Court Chief Justice Surya Kant comparing unemployed youth to cockroaches, and launched protests last month demanding the resignation of the Education Minister.
Combined with grievances over severe youth unemployment and other livelihood hardships, as well as dissatisfaction with the Modi administration's authoritarian governance style, the movement grew into the largest scale of protests since the 2020–2021 farmers' protests.
The protests escalated further when thousands attempted to march on parliament in New Delhi on the 20th, meeting with a police crackdown using tear gas and batons, and spread to states including West Bengal in the east, and Telangana, Karnataka, and Tamil Nadu in the south.
Foreign media reported that the government's acceptance of the CJP's demands is a rare instance of the Modi administration, which came to power in 2014, making concessions to anti-government protests and public sentiment.
Reuters also reported that this marks only the second time since Prime Minister Modi took office that a cabinet or sub-cabinet level official has stepped down under pressure from public opinion, following the 2018 resignation of then-Junior Foreign Minister M. J. Akbar over sexual harassment allegations during the "MeToo" movement.
(Photo: Yonhap News)
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