Another Marina Uprising in Jantar Mantar!
Student protests erupts against the Modi government!

Over a lakh of Indian students have united in New Delhi, protesting against the NEET question-paper leak, irregularities in CBSE exam evaluation and the actions of the Union Government which seek to completely marketise education. This massive gathering, which consists of over thousands of students who laid siege to the Parliament, has shaken the nation’s capital in an uproar. This is not a protest merely against examination irregularities; rather, it is a political uprising that has channelled a decade’s worth of accumulated frustration against education, unemployment and democratic rights amidst the country’s students and youth.

Unable to counter this student upsurge politically, the Modi regime, instead of addressing their demands, is attempting to crush the protest through repression by deploying the police and paramilitary forces. Instead of negotiating with the students who peacefully gathered to present their demands related to education, the government has responded with measures such as barriers, lathi-charges, tear gases, and suspension of internet services across the city.

The past few weeks in New Delhi have seen voices echoing in favour of gheraoing parliament. Following this, the Cockroach Janata Party (CJP) had called for a protest, demanding the resignation of the Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan, over issues including the NEET question-paper leak and CBSE evaluation scam. Emphasising this very demand, social activist Sonam Wangchuk has been on a hunger strike for several days. However, instead of responding to his demand, the police forcibly removed him from the hunger strike venue in a deteriorating state and have confined him in a hospital.

Meanwhile thousands, including students, research scholars, unemployed graduaters, and other youth, have assembled at the protest venue in Jantar Mantar, New Delhi, since yesterday. As a result, the roads on the way and surrounding the Parliament House have been blocked by tall iron barricades to stop the protesters. To prevent them from entering the Parliament, hundreds of police officers and paramilitary forces have been stationed on the ground by the government.

In spite of these obstacles, students have rallied forward, towards the parliament. In addition to carrying out severe lathi-charges, the police have also launched tear gas bombs against the protesters, causing injury to hundreds of students. More than 70 protesters have also been arrested.

Internet services were suspended in and around Jantar Mantar. Accompanied by a multi-layered security system around the parliament, armed paramilitary forces have been stationed all around. Frightened by the scale of students who rallied peacefully to assert their right to education, the State has employed a massive security cordon to confront them. Videos of armed paramilitary soldiers—ready to shoot students who dare to enter the Parliament building despite the barricades—have surfaced in several media outlets.

Ironically, the monsoon session of the Parliament was proceeding just as usual inside the building, without any regard to the students who were protesting outside, sustaining repression, and demanding protection for their future. The MPs presiding inside were not prepared to answer the student demands, nor were they initiating any discussion or debate concerning academic corruption. Instead, they were keen on introducing a law against disrespecting Vande Mataram as an act of anti-nationalism.

The activities of the opposition parties also do not match the significance of this protest. Although the Congress party voiced opposition to the NEET exam in the Parliamentary House, it merely registered a ritualistic objection rather than attempting to spark a political debate centered on the student uprising. The DMK members, on the other hand, created a commotion insisting on the adjournment of the Mekedatu dam issue in the House. While students were protesting on the streets outside the Parliament, the politicians tucked within the building did not go beyond the confines of their usual party squabbles.

Although the march towards Parliament was temporarily halted due to police repression, the protest has not come to an end. The students turned to Jantar Mantar yet again, continuing to protest by raising slogans against the Modi government. The central demand of this protest has today expanded beyond mere irregularities related to NEET or CBSE.

This is because the NEET question paper leak, the CBSE evaluation scam, etc., are not isolated incidents. Students have begun to view the reality for what it is—that these developments are the consequences of the government abdicating its responsibility for education by handing it over to private educational profiteers, and a symptom of a new education policy that is controlled by the private sector, implemented to suit market demands. Students perceive examinations not as tools to enhance the quality of public education, but as instruments that ensure profits for coaching centers, private educational institutions, and the corporate education market. The slogans of condemnation echoing at Jantar Mantar bear witness to this.

In addition to that, unprecedented unemployment has further intensified people’s rage. The youth who have wallowed in unemployment despite graduating after years of studies, who have been witnessing competitive examinations being continuously marred by irregularities, feel that their very future is being snatched away. Therefore, those participating in this protest do not only comprise students, but rather an entire struggling generation of youngsters trapped between education and employment.

This protest taking place at Jantar Mantar reminds the people of Tamil Nadu of the 2017 Marina uprising. Within a few days, it transcended the boundaries of a struggle to protect Tamil culture, and evolved into an expression of accumulated discontent against various actions of the Union government—including demonetisation, the Cauvery dispute, the fishermen’s issue, NEET, language policy, and state rights. Jallikattu served merely as a spark for the anger that had been simmering in people’s minds for years.

Today, a similar political dynamic has begun to unfold at Jantar Mantar as well. Even if the immediate cause of the ensuing protests is NEET and CBSE scams, the slogans echoing at the protest site are not solely about education. The anger that students and youth have harbored for years over issues ranging from the New Education Policy, the privatisation of education, and the credibility of competitive exams to unemployment, the future of the youth, and democratic rights—has erupted all at once.

No great mass uprising emerges out of nowhere on one fine day. Long-standing contradictions, grievances, and disappointments accumulated in society erupt, with a specific event acting as the spark. If Jallikattu was the spark in 2017 at the Marina protests, then today, the NEET and CBSE scandals have become the spark at Jantar Mantar. Therefore, this protest cannot be viewed merely as a reaction to examination-related irregularities. It must be understood as a political expression of the discontent that has been building up among students and the youth over the past decade.

Though the police forces were able to disperse the crowds in Marina Beach, those in power could not disperse the political impact it had on people’s minds. Similarly, the foundation of this protest cannot be destroyed by lathi charges against students, arrests, and internet suspension around Jantar Mantar.

As long as policies that surrender education to exploitation by private capitalists persist and an economic trajectory that ruins the future of Indian youth continues, new popular uprisings will continue to emerge, sparked by issues such as NEET, CBSE, unemployment, or any other grievance. Jantar Mantar is not merely a site of protest today; it has become a symbol of resistance for a new generation rising against the Modi government’s education policy and its broader political and economic trajectory.