Delhi High Court orders unblocking of Cockroach Janata Party's X account

The Centre told the court it blocked the Cockroach Janata Party's X account to prevent confusion among students and parents during the NEET exam. With the examination now over, the court said the concern no longer existed and ordered the account to be restored.

In Short

• CJP's account was blocked during NEET fearing student unrest
• Centre's concern over NEET exam chaos no longer valid post-exam, said court
• Group quickly gained huge social media following after launch

The Delhi High Court on Friday directed that the X account of the Cockroach Janata Party be unblocked after a bench of Justice Swarana Kanta Sharma allowed the petition filed by the party’s founder, Abhijit Dipke.

The court noted that the Centre’s primary concern, which had led to the blocking of the account, was no longer relevant as the NEET examination had already concluded. On that basis, the plea was allowed, reported Live Law.

During the hearing, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for the Union government, said the main concern behind blocking the party’s X account was that its posts could create chaos among students and parents during the NEET exam.

Taking note of this submission, the court observed that since the examination was now over, the issue cited by the Centre stood resolved. It then ordered that the X account of the Cockroach Janata Party be unblocked.

With this, the High Court allowed Dipke’s plea, holding that the concern raised by the Union government in relation to the NEET examination no longer survived after the exam had ended.

The X account of the satirical online collective was blocked in India on May 21, five days after the group was launched and quickly gathered momentum on social media. Its rise came amid anger over remarks made by about unemployed youth.

The satirical campaign emerged after remarks made by Chief Justice of India Surya Kant during a court hearing triggered a political row and a storm on social media. The judge had said, “There are youngsters, like cockroaches, who don't get any employment or have any place in profession. Some of them become media, some of them become social media, RTI activists and other activists, and they start attacking everyone.”

CJI Kant later said his comments were directed at people allegedly obtaining fake degrees, and not unemployed youth in general.

The action was taken at a time when the group had become one of the country’s fastest-growing online trends. Its Instagram account crossed 16.4 million followers within days, moving ahead of the Bharatiya Janata Party’s official Instagram page, while thousands of users also signed up through online membership forms shared by the collective.

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