‘I will die for this cause’: how India’s cockroach meme became the biggest challenge to Modi’s grip on power

Cockroach supporters form a human chain to control the crowd during the continuing protests at the Jantar Mantar in Delhi Photograph: Adnan Abidi/Reuters

As the poster bearing the face of the prime minister, Narendra Modi, was thrown to the floor, a cheer went up. Then came the feet, trampling the image into the muddy ground with gleeful abandon. “Thief, thief,” chanted the crowd.

Just a week earlier, such scenes in the heart of India’s capital would have been almost unthinkable. For the 12 years Modi and his Bharatiya Janata party (BJP) have been in power it was widely acknowledged that you criticised the government at your peril. Dissent was swiftly, routinely and expertly crushed.