- Gandhi asks Modi to resign “for destroying the future of India’s youth”.
- 60 protesters injured in clashes with security forces in New Delhi.
- Protest organizers condemn the “highhandedness” of the authorities.
NEW DELHI: India’s main opposition leader Rahul Gandhi on Tuesday demanded that Prime Minister Narendra Modi resign over police crackdown on student protests demanding reforms in the education system.
Modi must resign “for destroying the future of India’s youth”, the Congress party leader said in a social media post as he led a march with other MPs towards the prime minister’s residence in New Delhi.
“The government does not want to take any responsibility, nor does it want to have a debate about it in Parliament,” said Gandhi, the leader of the opposition in the lower house.
Gandhi later staged a sit-in protest outside Modi’s residence, where chants of “we want justice” were mixed with chants of “down with Modi”.
Hours later, AFP reporters saw Gandhi and other parliamentarians being bundled into a bus and taken away from the area.
The development comes after police said 60 protesters were injured in clashes with security forces in the heart of New Delhi on Monday, marking the biggest street rally in the capital in about five years.
Thousands of protesters gathered to demand the resignation of Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan following an appeal by the online movement Cockroach Janta Party (CJP).
Police fired tear gas and charged with batons at protesters, who responded by throwing stones. At least 118 policemen were also injured, Delhi Police said of Monday’s clashes.
“What happened yesterday is that our constitution was trampled on,” said Sandeep Dixit, a senior leader of the Congress party. AFP.
“After that, no self-respecting politician or citizen can stand aside.”
The CJP vowed to press ahead with its demands for Pradhan’s removal as thousands of protesters remained encamped at Delhi’s Jantar Mantar protest site on Tuesday, many of them calling for changes in the wider education system.
The CJP has gained millions of followers on social media since its launch in May, fueling one of the biggest challenges to Hindu nationalist leader Modi since he won a third term in office in 2024.
‘Shameful Day’
“We will not stop. Pradhan must be fired,” CJP spokesperson Ashutosh Ranka said on social media.
CJP founder Abhijeet Dipke on Tuesday urged the protesters not to lose hope.
“They want to break our spirit,” he said, sitting on top of a truck. “Don’t let them silence you.”
Protest organizers condemned the authorities’ “arrogance” and said hundreds of protesters had been injured.
“It is a shameful day in the history of Indian democracy that people, honest students who had come for a genuine issue, were brutally beaten by the Delhi Police,” Ranka said. AFP.
Ranka, who met senior minister JP Nadda on Monday, said the government was yet to respond to their demands.
Protesters said they would not relent.
“We have become even more fearless now,” said 25-year-old law student Chandra Pratap Sishwi.
“When I saw people being beaten like that by the police, my blood boiled.”
Parliament was adjourned on Tuesday after the opposition benches demanded a discussion on the alleged “brutality unleashed on students”.
Despite rapid economic growth, millions of people in the world’s most populous nation still struggle to find stable and well-paid jobs, fueling discontent.
The protests follow a series of investigation scandals that have shaken confidence in India’s testing system.
About 2.2 million aspiring medical students sat for a re-exam under tight security last month after the previous test was scrapped following the leak of a question paper.
It came on top of another scandal involving the online marking of tests taken by nearly two million high school students.
Parliamentary Affairs Minister Kiren Rijiju on Tuesday defended the government, saying it had acted quickly after the exam paper was leaked by arresting several people.
He said Modi had called for a “foolproof system” to prevent irregularities in the future at a closed-door meeting with his allies on Tuesday.
Modi has yet to comment directly on the protests.
