YouTuber Dhruv Rathee was released from police custody in the late hours of Saturday, with authorities indicating that further action remained a possibility should he take part in any renewed demonstration by the Cockroach Janta Party at Jantar Mantar, according to officials speaking on Sunday.
Rathee, who resides in Germany and has publicly opposed the Narendra Modi government on multiple occasions, had travelled to Delhi to take part in a Citizens for Justice and Peace demonstration calling for the removal of Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar over what organisers described as irregularities in the Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls. Officers took him into custody at his home in Sector 56, located within Gurugram in the state of Haryana. Rathee was released on that same Saturday evening, some hours after a number of the other detained protesters had already been freed.
Delhi Police announced on Sunday that Abhijeet Dipke, who founded CJP, along with co-convenors Saurav Das and Ashutosh Ranka, had been taken into preventive custody. A hearing before an executive magistrate was expected to take place for them before the day concluded.
Formal charges under two provisions of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023 — Section 126, which addresses security obligations for maintaining peace, and Section 170, which covers arrest powers aimed at preventing cognisable offences — were laid against the three leaders, according to police. Dipke, Das, and Ranka were taken into custody upon arriving at Delhi's Indira Gandhi International Airport that Saturday. A gathering at Jantar Mantar, organised under the CJP banner against Kumar, had been part of their intended plans.
Among those taken into custody and subsequently released in the course of the police operation were several hundred individuals, among them former chief ministers Arvind Kejriwal, Mamata Banerjee, Pinarayi Vijayan, and Manik Sarkar. Facing the detention of its members, the organisation issued a call for supporters to gather at Jantar Mantar on Sunday while reaffirming its intention to continue the campaign.
A letter from Bhaskar Rao, who previously held the position of Bengaluru Police Commissioner, was sent to the Union Ministry of Home Affairs requesting that Rathee's citizenship, immigration status, and adherence to visa conditions be examined. Rao raised the question of whether a foreign national present in India on a specific visa or immigration status holds any legal standing to take part in, or address, an organised political demonstration directed at the country's constitutional and statutory institutions. His demands included questions about whether prior authorisation had been required, along with a call for consequences to follow should any breach of relevant laws or visa terms be confirmed.
Several Opposition parties — including the Aam Aadmi Party, Trinamool Congress, the Left parties, and the Samajwadi Party — declared their support for the CJP agitation. A number of figures from Opposition parties took part in the demonstration and were held by authorities for a period before their release. No formal participation by the Congress in the agitation was reported.
The Bharatiya Janata Party disputed the turnout at Sunday's rally and contended that INDIA bloc leaders had organised their participation with the aim of provoking public unrest. Ravi Shankar Prasad, a BJP member of Parliament, put forward the view that Opposition parties ought to bring their political grievances to Parliament rather than to the streets, contending that public demonstrations of that kind amounted to an interference with ordinary civic life.
