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Protest to Crackdown: The Aftermath of Jantar Mantar | South Central 86

This week on South Central, Dhanya Rajendran and Pooja Prasanna discuss the aftermath of the Jantar Mantar protests, led by the Cockroach Janta Party. Editor of The Wire, Seema Chisti, and Peek TV co-founder Vedanta Agarwal join them.

Dhanya Rajendran, Pooja Prasanna

Published:31st Jul, 2026 at 7:08 PM

In this week’s South Central, hosts Dhanya Rajendran and Pooja Prasanna discuss the aftermath of the Jantar Mantar protests, led by the Cockroach Janta Party. They are joined by senior journalist and editor of The Wire, Seema Chisti, and Peek TV co-founder Vedanta Agarwal.

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Seema Chisti begins by commenting on the government’s denial of the use of pellet guns and violence on the protestors.

“The government keeps denying this, but we must also take note. The CRPF chief was quoted as saying to go for the protests fearlessly. But I am unsure what that means with the government using force nonetheless. The government also seems to unleash a lot of demonstrative brutality on all kinds of protests across the country. This is to show how people who raise dissent will be treated. But this generation is not typical in the sense that they come from all parts of the political spectrum, and that is also confusing and scaring the government,” she says.

Vedanta says that now we are seeing an outreach to Gen Z by the government.

“We see politicians use Gen Z words in Parliament as well. There seems to be an attempt to turn this into a homogenous, elite movement. This one-size-fits-all outreach to Gen Z is unfortunate. The protests saw people from all cross sections, and that is the truth. This has been a diverse movement. There was also a time when senior journalists said why we should cover protests, but people were still turning up for various protests. Just because mainstream media does not cover it, and numbers were small, we cannot normalise ignoring protests or protestors being ignored. On July 20th, my cameraperson and I were caught in a crossfire. The government had issued orders to the police to clear roads at all costs. Tear gas was fired from both sides of the Sansad Marg, and protestors were running all across to save themselves. Protestors took shelter at a Masjid there, and police were using batons, lathis and gas to clear the roads. We spoke to multiple victims, and they said that the police pinned a group of women to a wall and fired rubber bullets, causing permanent damage to their ears for many,” he recalls.

Pooja notes that the orders may have been to clear roads, but the intention of the police seems to be something more sinister, considering the use of such brute force.

“I think, in their desire to distort what India is, and how generations move and revolt, the BJP has forgotten that people have agency. History is replete with incidents where the children of the elite and even kings have squandered their privileges for the betterment of society,” Seema says.

Pooja speaks about the BJP’s ‘sanskar’ spin on the conduct of the protestors. Dhanya says that when a party has used abuses left, right and centre, there is an irony in picking out the language of the youngsters during the protests. “These are not people abusing from a point of power, unlike the BJP. Isn’t that kind of power abuse far more dangerous?” she asks.

Vedanta says that several students speak about being frisked by police officials at metro stations. “A woman told us that her phone and WhatsApp chats were checked. On what basis is this happening? And the cops used the term ‘anti-national’. Such is the travesty of law and order we are witnessing,” he adds.

Seema says that when it comes to language, it is not as if we support profanity. “A lot of the profanity is used fully in conjunction with violence, death threats, and rape threats. Even the most extreme words on placards do not wish death or violence. The CJI of India used terms like cockroach and parasite. Even that is abuse. So to understand what kind of abuse is also being hurled out by the topmost authorities, what should we expect to trickle down?” she asks.

The panel further discusses how the mainstream media disseminated government narratives, the way forward for the CJP, and more.

Tune in to this discussion here.

Audio timecodes:

00:00:00 - Introduction

00:02:43 - Headlines

00:09:01 - Aftermath of CJP protest

1:08:12 - Recommendations

1:12:55 - Letters

Reference:

A truck full of stones appeared near the CJP protest. We found out how

Peek TV’s Priyanshi explains the Gen Z distrust of 'established media'.

How BJP lost to Gen Z ? ( Rofl Gandhi Explains)