CJP protests at Jantar Mantar: The youth movement India’s Modi didn’t see coming

“There is deep economic dissatisfaction and distress, which has translated into a lack of hope about the future,” Aiyar says. “This could reflect growing exhaustion with a government that has been in power for a long time. Its failure to deliver on the promises it built its reputation on may have reached a tipping point.”

For her, the protests are about far more than a single policy failure.

“The message from protesters is clear: we’re exhausted. We need a new kind of politics, a new political grammar – one rooted in ideas and focused on governance and delivery.”

Whether that frustration can be sustained as a political movement, however, is another question.

Political scientist Suhas Palshikar argues the Cockroach movement may simply provide an outlet for public anger before gradually losing steam, much like the farmers’ protests.

“Where will the Cockroach movement go? Perhaps nowhere – it will allow venting of frustration and taper off,” he wrote on X.

He also cautions against romanticising it as a Gen Z uprising.

“It would be a mistake to imagine a youth movement or a Gen Z movement – these are only convenient myths for commentators.” The movement’s “ideological and political character… is currently fluid”, he argues, with different political forces likely to seek influence over it.

What the protesters have undeniably shown, he says, is a willingness to confront the state.

“The young have shown their angst and their disgust. They have borne the brunt of the democratic government’s brutal police. They have also shown that only street action makes this regime… listen and talk.”

Whether that energy can endure, Palshikar argues, will depend on many factors, including state repression, media blackouts, leadership challenges and the difficulty of building a broad social coalition.

Economist Surajit Mazumdar of Delhi’s Jawaharlal Nehru University also believes the movement already points to something much larger than examination paper leaks.