Anita Anand | Why, in the India of Today, All of Us Need To Turn Into ‘Cockroaches’

Among all the things we humans can aspire to be, who would want to be a “cockroach”?

The Cockroach Janta Party (CJP), founded on May 16 this year, is inviting young people to join its ranks. It was formed in response to remarks made by the incumbent Chief Justice of India, Justice Surya Kant, on May 15, in which he said: “There are youngsters like cockroaches who do not get any employment or have any place in the profession. Some of them become media people, some become social media people, RTI activists, and other activists, and they start attacking everyone.”

The next day, Abhijeet Dipke, an Indian student at Boston University in the United States, announced on the social media platform X the launch of a “platform for all the ‘cockroaches’ out there”.

The eligibility criteria were being unemployed, lazy, chronically online, and able to rant professionally. Abhijeet Dipke is a political communications strategist who previously worked with the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP).

The party’s website went live with the tagline “Voice of the Lazy & Unemployed”. Within 78 hours of its launch, the Instagram account crossed three million followers, surpassed ten million in under five days, overtaking the ruling BJP’s official handle. As of May 22, the account had over twenty million followers. It also crossed 200,000 followers on X and claims to have registered over 350,000 members through online forms.

The CJP is demanding the resignation of Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan. At the CJP’s first press conference on June 3, the movement’s spokesperson, Saurav Das, said: “We seek minimum accountability from this system, where rot has set in.”

The protest concerns the government’s cancellation of the qualifying National Eligibility Cum Entrance Test (NEET), conducted by the National Testing Agency (NTA), due to the leakage of exam papers. The exam enables young people to enter the job market. NEET is a common, uniform test for admission to undergraduate medical education at all medical institutions.

According to the NEET website, the exam has been rescheduled for June 21.

While the CJP calls itself a party, it is not registered as one. Right now, it is a movement, spearheaded by young people who are tired of being dismissed by the so-called bastions of law and order in India. Many of these are well past their prime and disconnected not only from what is going on in the country but also from the challenges faced by the youth, people of every age group, and the minorities.

On June 6, a huge rally was held at Jantar Mantar in New Delhi, where the CJP gave the education minister a week to resign. Besides the call for his resignation, their manifesto is limited, but it also calls for parity in other aspects of life.

The current ruling party, the BJP, doesn’t understand NGOs and civil society activists and has treated them as threats over the last 12 years. Those questioning government policies are arrested, harassed, and even killed. These are not terrorists or anti-nationals, as they have been branded by the government. In a democracy, they are asking for transparency and parity.

The government views development as offering schemes and doling out licences to the already rich and powerful businessmen and women of the country, which it considers legitimate. Dissent is silenced.

While the demands for the resignation of ministers in other countries for various reasons may or may not have borne out, many have resigned. However, India’s politicians are particularly thick-skinned and adamant about staying in power. The party leader remains silent. However, the stepping down or removal of the education minister may not bring about change in the ministry, which has been systematically destroyed by the ruling party’s backwards-looking policies. This rot has spread to almost all ministries and institutions, which have been destroyed.

The Chief Justice’s use of the term “cockroaches” to refer to the youth is interesting.

My research suggests that cockroaches are indeed marvellous creatures. They display collective decision-making when choosing food sources. When a sufficient number of individuals (a “quorum”) exploit a food source, this signals to newcomer cockroaches to stay there longer rather than leave for elsewhere. Cockroaches appear to use just two pieces of information to decide where to go, namely how dark it is and how many other cockroaches there are. A study used specially scented, roach-sized robots that seemed real to the roaches to demonstrate that once there are enough insects in a place to form a critical mass, the roaches accepted the collective decision about where to hide, even in an unusually well-lit place.

Cooperation and competition are balanced in cockroach group decision-making behaviour.

Can the honourable judge say the same of his profession and his peers? And indeed, of the present government?

The CJP may or may not amount to much. But it’s here now, raising issues that need to be raised in large numbers. And we can only be concerned with the present. Other youth movements, most recently in Nepal and Bangladesh, have managed to topple long-standing governments in their countries. What the future holds for them, no one can say. But the message is clear. People are fed up.

Beyond the whataboutery surrounding the CJP movement lies the essential question: how long can citizens endure a government that has reneged on almost all its promises since coming to power in 2014? By promoting hate and fear and playing the Hindutva card, it has violated most principles of the Constitution. It must be held accountable.

While my age doesn’t qualify me to join the movement, I am going to say I am a cockroach anyway. Are you?

The writer is a development and communications consultant