India’s “Cockroach” protesters are back on the streets, this time turning their focus to electoral reforms and demanding the resignation of Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar.
The Cockroach Janta Party (CJP), which began as an online satirical movement led by founder Abhijeet Dipke, held a major protest at Mumbai’s Shivaji Park on Friday, calling for what it described as the need to “save democracy” and seeking Kumar’s removal from office.
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The demonstration is part of a wider campaign the group says it plans to take across the country during October, before culminating in a rally in Delhi.
Thousands of people attended the Mumbai protest, according to the BBC, with a large proportion of the crowd comprising young supporters. Some participants reportedly travelled from outside Mumbai, including Nagpur. Police maintained a heavy presence around the venue, where CJP leaders addressed supporters from a stage mounted on a truck.
At the same time, hundreds of people attempting to stage a CJP protest at Delhi’s Jantar Mantar were detained by police, according to the BBC.
The latest agitation follows renewed controversy surrounding the Election Commission and the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls.
The protests were triggered in part by a report in The Indian Express claiming that Election Commissioners Sukhbir Singh Sandhu and Vivek Joshi had formally objected at least 14 times over a 10-month period to decisions and orders they said had been issued without their knowledge.
The reported disagreements were largely linked to the controversial revision of electoral rolls.
The Election Commission has defended the process, saying SIR is intended to identify and remove duplicate and ineligible entries. According to the BBC, around 130 million names have so far been removed from electoral rolls.
Opposition parties and activists, however, have alleged that eligible voters could also have been affected and accused the Election Commission of manipulating the process to benefit Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). The BJP and the Election Commission have rejected those allegations.
The Indian Express report also raised questions over the voter database, the process for enrolling new voters and the security of electoral rolls.
The Election Commission, responding to the controversy, said differing views were part of its decision-making process and maintained that decisions were taken unanimously.
The developments have nevertheless triggered a fresh political confrontation. Opposition leaders, including Congress leader Rahul Gandhi and West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, have demanded action against the Election Commission and Kumar.
The INDIA opposition alliance has also announced plans for protests across the country. According to the BBC, opposition MPs are scheduled to march towards the Election Commission’s office in Delhi on October 6.
For the CJP, the Mumbai demonstration marks another major stage in its transformation from an online satirical campaign into a street-level pressure group. Its latest campaign places electoral rolls, voter rights and the functioning of the Election Commission at the centre of its protests.
The Election Commission has not responded to the CJP’s demand for Kumar’s resignation, while the BBC said it had also sought comment from the commission over the allegations.
