May 22, 2026 11:45 am IST

Opinion | Why India's 'Cockroach' Rebellion Should Terrify The Opposition

The Opposition will make the mistake of thinking that this 'cockroach' moment is about anti-BJP hate. It's not. It's about its own failings.

Rasheed Kidwai Rasheed Kidwai Columnist

Rasheed Kidwai Columnist

The sudden catapulting of the Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) to India's democratic consciousness is easy to misread. In a country where politics is often reduced to pro-BJP or anti-BJP reflexes, the temptation is to see the CJP as another flash of dissent against the ruling party. That, however, would be too convenient. The deeper truth is perhaps more uncomfortable: the cockroach has crawled across the entire political floor. It is not merely mocking those in power. It is exposing those who wish to replace them.

The CJP began after remarks attributed to Chief Justice Surya Kant, who reportedly referred to some unemployed youngsters as "cockroaches" and "parasites", before clarifying that the comments concerned people with fraudulent degrees, not India's youth. The phrase detonated online because it seemed to compress a generation's humiliation into one insect metaphor. Within days, the satirical movement that is the CJP had crossed millions of Instagram followers, overtaking the BJP's official Instagram count at one point, while its X account was withheld in India after a legal demand.

But the numbers are less important than the emotional code. The CJP website calls itself the "Voice of the Lazy & Unemployed" and "a political party for the people the system forgot to count". Its poster says, "They tried to step on us. We came back." That is not just a meme. It is the grammar of a generation that feels insulted by institutions, ignored by parties, and patronised by leaders who still speak in the language of obedience.

The Opposition Has Got It Wrong

Umang Singhar, the senior Congress politician and Leader of the Opposition in the Madhya Pradesh Assembly, publicly referred to the CJP on May 21, voicing his support on his official social media pages in an encouraging example of active listening and generational empathy in a democracy.

At the same time, the opposition should be careful before celebrating the CJP as a ready-made,........

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