'PM Modi loves Gyanesh Kumar more than Dharmendra Pradhan': Memes mock Jantar Mantar crackdown

For many online, the scale of security arrangements for a democratic protest felt like an 'undeclared Emergency'. For Gen Z, however, it was also an opportunity to do what the internet does best: turn political absurdity into memes

Delhi was put under an extraordinary security blanket on Saturday as police moved to prevent protesters from reaching Jantar Mantar for the "Jantar Mantar 2.0" demonstration, called by the Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) and backed by Opposition parties to demand the removal of chief election commissioner Gyanesh Kumar over alleged electoral irregularities.

The crackdown saw Opposition MPs, student leaders and journalists detained, while restrictions and security checks disrupted movement in parts of the capital.

For many online, the scale of the arrangements was a reminder of an "undeclared Emergency". For Gen Z, however, it was also an opportunity to do what the internet does best: turn political absurdity into memes.

Social media users poked fun at the reported deployment of 25,000 police and paramilitary personnel, the cancellation of Delhi-bound trains, restrictions at metro stations, suspension of mobile internet around Jantar Mantar and intensive checks across the city.

But one unlikely target of the memes was former Union education minister Dharmendra Pradhan.

"Dharmendra Pradhan watching Modi shutting down entire Delhi to save Gyanesh Kumar," a user wrote on X, comparing the government's response to the two protests at Jantar Mantar.

The joke referred to July's protests. In July, Pradhan resigned amid mounting pressure from CJP-led protests over the NEET paper leak. The demonstrations, led by climate activist Sonam Wangchuk and CJP founder Abhijeet Dipke, had made Jantar Mantar their principal protest site.

The earlier protests had also faced police action. Security forces faced allegations of using excessive force, including pellet guns, against demonstrators.

This time, the security arrangements around Delhi seemed designed to make reaching Jantar Mantar a protest in itself. If the July demonstrations showed how difficult it could be to contain a sustained agitation at the site, Saturday's restrictions offered a different lesson in crowd management: keep the crowd from getting there in the first place.

The memes soon moved beyond the familiar templates. One user suggested that Pradhan must now be offering crisis counselling to the chief election commissioner -- a role reversal that would have been difficult to imagine when the NEET protests were at their height.

After all, many thought that after Pradhan, it was the time for Nitin Gadkari or even Nirmala Sitharaman who my be forced to resign.

Another user borrowed a scene from the Bollywood blockbuster Chak De! India. In the film, hockey player Bindia Naik, played by Shilpa Shukla, challenges coach Kabir Khan, played by Shah Rukh Khan: "What does she have that I don't?"

Recast in the context of the two protests, the question mocked what users saw as the difference in the government's response to Pradhan's political crisis and the demands directed at Kumar.

As videos of police personnel hauling protesters into buses circulated online, another user invoked writer Harishankar Parsai's description of a dictator so fearful that even five donkeys grazing together might appear to be conspiring against him.

"If even five donkeys are grazing together, the dictator fears that the donkeys too are conspiring against me. The dictator is very cowardly," the post quoted Parsai as saying.

One user offered a solution to the recurring problem of protests at the site: "Rename Jantar Mantar to Shri Narendra Modi Astronomical Observatory. All protests will stop."

The logic was difficult to fault, at least by the standards of internet humour. After all, an astronomical observatory might be a more convenient place to study distant stars than to confront the people running the country.

The ridicule was not confined to social media. In Kerala, a group of protesters staged a street performance depicting Kumar confined to a makeshift cage. A man wearing a mask of the chief election commissioner was carried in the cage by four others as slogans were raised.

The memes cannot resolve the allegations surrounding electoral irregularities or settle the debate over the police response.

But they have found a way to frame the political contrast that Saturday's crackdown brought into focus: a government that once faced sustained pressure over a paper leak now stands accused by protesters of using extraordinary measures to contain a demonstration targeting the head of the Election Commission of India, which has no connection to the BJP.

And somewhere in the middle of that comparison sits Pradhan -- no longer the minister at the centre of the earlier agitation, but a supporting character in the internet's latest political joke.