By Tora Agarwala
NEW DELHI, July 22 (Reuters) - A steady stream of food delivery riders carrying meals, snacks and bottled water is helping sustain a youth-led protest movement that has sprung up in the heart of India’s capital.
Motorcycles weave through traffic before pulling up beside clusters of volunteers, ferrying donations from supporters across India and abroad unable to join a rare display of public dissent against Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government.
“From Kerala to the USA, orders are coming from everywhere,” said rider Suraj Kumar, 25, sitting atop his motorcycle with a bag of kachoris, a popular deep-fried snack, as some volunteers climbed over police barricades to take delivery of the packages.
A volunteer took the packet and passed it hand-to-hand towards the centre of the protest site a few hundred metres away around Delhi’s Jantar Mantar observatory, where hundreds of people gathered around a raised platform.
There, leaders of the Cockroach Janta Party (CJP), a movement that began as online satire in May, demanded the resignation of Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan over repeated test paper leaks. They have been there since last month but the protest gained momentum only in recent days after a prominent activist began an indefinite hunger strike in support.
PROTEST SUSTAINED BY ‘PEOPLE’S KINDNESS’, SAYS STUDENT
The encampment has endured despite a major police crackdown on Monday, when tens of thousands of mostly young people tried to march on parliament. Indians under 30 are estimated to make up more than half of the country’s 1.42 billion population, and many have long complained that years of strong economic growth have failed to create enough jobs.
“People are angry, especially after the police started beating innocent students. But not everyone can come here so they are sending food,” said Raj Rathore, 25, a volunteer who has spent the past few days unloading and distributing deliveries including water bottles, fruit and biscuits.
Those contributions, along with volunteer-run support networks, have helped keep the protest running around the clock, students said.
“This protest is running purely because of people’s kindness, and the fact that we are all united,” said Rina Rawat, a Delhi University student herding people into queues inside the protest site.
Rawat, 20, was struck on her left leg by police batons on Monday but returned the next day to “do her duty”, she said.
PROTEST FEATURES RARE OPEN CRITICISM OF MODI
Modi has not directly commented on the protests, though a minister said after a meeting of the ruling coalition that the premier had told them the “strongest possible steps are being taken to protect the interest of the students”. Pradhan promised “answers, reforms and accountability”.
At the protest site, the number of protesters swelled to 5,000 by late afternoon on Wednesday despite intermittent monsoon showers. Most were Gen Z students carrying placards, blasting patriotic Bollywood songs and chanting slogans.
“Modi, we won’t tolerate your autocracy,” shouted a protester as the crowd cheered, a rare sight under a leader who has dominated Indian politics since taking power in 2014.
“I was a Modi supporter until 10 days ago,” said Mukesh, who declined to give his second name. “But when I saw the police brutality, I was shocked.”
YOUNG DOCTORS, MEDICAL STUDENTS PROVIDE FIRST AID, MEDICINES
Volunteers cleared puddles and collected garbage while others used hand-held fans to keep protesters cool in the humidity.
A medical stall staffed by volunteer doctors and medical students has operated at the site for about a month. Volunteers said they had been especially busy over the past two days.
“We are providing first aid and medicines for dizziness and nausea,” said Bhavna, 23, who did not want to share her last name. “We too have suffered because of paper leaks, the anxiety that gives you is enormous.”
Many protesters drew inspiration from India’s independence movement, carrying portraits of revolutionary Bhagat Singh, holding copies of the Constitution and handing out roses. Others donned Spider-Man masks and held slogans describing themselves as “baddies”.
Nearby, 19-year-old Arpita Verma said “there’s been too much Hindu-Muslim politics in India”, referring to sharper religious divisions under Modi’s party that draws support mainly from the Hindu majority.
“But we have no space for that here — now we are united by a common cause, and we are not afraid at all.”
(Editing by Krishna N. Das, Editing by William Maclean)
