The ‘cockroaches’’ victory over Modi

Yesterday, the National Testing Agency – the Indian government body responsible for organising university entrance exams – sacked 47 officials following the scandal involving leaked questions in the NEET entrance exams, the test used annually to select medical students in India. The agency announced that it will also take legal action against them. The decision comes the day after Prime Minister Narendra Modi, in a late-night video message posted on X, announced a draft bill introducing harsher penalties and fast-track legal proceedings for those who manipulate public examinations. The Cabinet then approved, in record time, a number of amendments to the Public Examinations Act – the anti-cheating legislation for public examinations – which toughen penalties for those who breach it and are due to be tabled in Parliament next week. It is a partial victory for the protesters who have been demonstrating for weeks at Jantar Mantar in Delhi, led by the Cockroach Janta Party – a student movement that emerged following the cancellation of the 2026 NEET exam due to the scandal over leaked questions, which was followed by several student suicides. Moreover, public pressure was becoming unsustainable for Modi: the ‘cockroach’ protest had made the headlines in all the international newspapers, including the hunger strike by activist Sonam Wangchuk – which ended yesterday following negotiations with two government ministers – and, above all, last Monday’s police charge against students marching peacefully towards Parliament – in what Sonia Gandhi described in The Hindu as ‘the day of infamy’ – against students marching peacefully towards Parliament. Modi must have realised that the international diplomatic show serves little purpose if, domestically, his government struggles to respond to the demands of the most vulnerable sections of the population, “from students to farmers”, as Gandhi wrote. It is not over for the “cockroaches”: they want the Education Minister to resign, and they want a political class that listens. Otherwise, there is a risk that the protest, rather than being quelled, will spread.