SS: Even the night before Narendra Modi accepted the resignation of his education minister, India’s prime minister appeared confident that the largest mass uprising to take place in his 12 years in power would do little to rattle his government.
Addressing his “young friends” in a late-night Instagram selfie reel on Friday, he thanked the people – who were mobilised en masse across the country, shouting anti-government slogans – for their “thoughtful suggestions”.
Less than 24 hours later, Modi, who has fiercely cultivated his strongman image for years, had bowed to public pressure and accepted the resignation of Dharmendra Pradhan. It was, say analysts, the remarkable humbling of a government that has ruled with almost untouchable impunity since 2014.
Over that past week, a gen Z movement that called itself the Cockroach Janta party (CJP) mobilised unprecedented protests in the name of justice for millions of young people, after the leaking of a crucial exam paper forced 2 million students to resit the test and was blamed for more than a dozen suicides.
The resignation of Pradhan, Modi’s loyal political ally, remained their first and foremost demand for accountability, even as the protests expanded into a wider fight for democracy. Yet Pradhan went unmentioned by Modi in his Instagram address.
No1_Dukakis_Fan on
I will have to see the BJP lose some state elections before coming to that conclusion.
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SS: Even the night before Narendra Modi accepted the resignation of his education minister, India’s prime minister appeared confident that the largest mass uprising to take place in his 12 years in power would do little to rattle his government.
Addressing his “young friends” in a late-night Instagram selfie reel on Friday, he thanked the people – who were mobilised en masse across the country, shouting anti-government slogans – for their “thoughtful suggestions”.
Less than 24 hours later, Modi, who has fiercely cultivated his strongman image for years, had bowed to public pressure and accepted the resignation of Dharmendra Pradhan. It was, say analysts, the remarkable humbling of a government that has ruled with almost untouchable impunity since 2014.
Over that past week, a gen Z movement that called itself the Cockroach Janta party (CJP) mobilised unprecedented protests in the name of justice for millions of young people, after the leaking of a crucial exam paper forced 2 million students to resit the test and was blamed for more than a dozen suicides.
The resignation of Pradhan, Modi’s loyal political ally, remained their first and foremost demand for accountability, even as the protests expanded into a wider fight for democracy. Yet Pradhan went unmentioned by Modi in his Instagram address.
I will have to see the BJP lose some state elections before coming to that conclusion.