Indian police detained more than 2,000 protesters in Delhi on Saturday, along with the founder of the “Cockroach” youth movement, as security forces sealed off parts of the capital to stop a rally calling for the election chief to step down. A home ministry official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said more than 2,000 people had been held across the city. Police had not publicly responded to the detentions at the time of reporting.
The target of the demonstration was Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar. Protesters were angry over a revision of voter lists that critics say unfairly favours the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Local media reported that about 400 protesters were also held in Mumbai, India’s financial hub.
Security forces seal central Delhi before planned rally
Thousands of police and paramilitary personnel were posted across the capital as authorities moved to block the protest. Mobile internet services were cut in the central business district, and dozens of metro stations and markets were closed. The movement had intended to bring thousands of people to Jantar Mantar in central Delhi, but the site was cordoned off before the gathering could begin.
Smaller demonstrations still broke out in other parts of the city, including a well-known crafts market and the memorial to Mahatma Gandhi. Demonstrators there called for Kumar to resign. A witness working for an international news agency said police chased young protesters and dragged many of them onto buses, while more people kept arriving at the scene.
Checkpoints were set up on major roads and entry points across a city of around 20 million people. Officers boarded buses to search for protesters and inspected vehicles, while barricades and concrete blocks slowed traffic. Anti-riot vehicles fitted with tear-gas launchers were stationed along key routes.
Cockroach Janta Party leaders held on arrival in Delhi
The Cockroach Janta Party said its founder, Abhijeet Dipke, and senior leaders Saurav Das and Ashutosh Ranka were detained when their flight from Mumbai landed in Delhi. The group condemned the detentions as authoritarian, demanded the leaders’ release and said it would keep protesting. Television footage showed Dipke confronting officers who came to him on the aircraft, telling them he had come to be arrested and was not afraid of them. One officer replied that it was not an arrest and asked him to cooperate.
The party’s leader, Ajinkya Shinde, told reporters that demonstrations would continue on the following days and until Kumar resigned. The party also said authorities would not share information about the leaders’ whereabouts or health, even after news reached them that Dipke’s grandmother had died. Police said Dipke had been informed of the death and offered help to travel home for the funeral.
Several opposition lawmakers were also detained, according to television channels. Among those shown being held were former chief ministers Mamata Banerjee of West Bengal, Arvind Kejriwal of Delhi and Pinarayi Vijayan of Kerala. Representatives of two digital news outlets said police briefly detained four of their reporters while they were covering the protests, and one journalist from an international news agency was also held for a short time before being freed.
Voter roll revision fuels allegations against election commission
The demonstrations represent one of the most serious challenges yet for Modi. They stem from claims that election authorities improperly revised voter rolls ahead of recent state polls. Protests gained momentum last week after the Indian Express reported that two election commissioners had raised questions about Kumar’s revisions, which removed roughly 130 million names from the rolls.
Kumar has not commented publicly. The Election Commission and the BJP have both denied any wrongdoing. The BJP argues that its electoral success reflects Modi’s popularity and India’s economic growth, and it accuses opposition parties of spreading misinformation. The near-daily protests follow months of demonstrations over exam paper leaks, which forced the education minister to resign.
Opposition parties say the deletions affected the outcome of recent state elections won by the BJP, and they have raised doubts about voting in the world’s largest democracy. Election Commission data show that about 130 million voter entries were removed during the verification exercise. The breakdown includes 63 million people who had relocated, 30 million who could not be traced and 28 million who had died.
- 63 million people who had relocated
- 30 million people who could not be traced
- 28 million people who had died
The commission says the removals relate to entries identified during the draft revision process. It has said any eligible voter who was wrongly deleted can re-enrol. The unrest also comes ahead of a series of important state elections starting in early 2027. Rahul Gandhi, leader of the main opposition Congress party, said Modi’s opponents would not back down. Senior BJP member Ravi Shankar Prasad said his party does not oppose demonstrations, but argued that rivals had turned the street protests into a political weapon after their election defeats.
