Five months after its founding, India’s Cockroach Janta Party, known as the CJP, has revealed what youth-led democratic movements can achieve – and how hard they are to sustain.
The movement was formed in May 2026 to protest the government’s cancellation of medical school entrance exams and after India’s Chief Justice Surya Kant likened unemployed youth to cockroaches. By July, the largely Gen Z movement had scored an early victory with the resignation of Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan.
