India’s Gen Z have flipped the lowly cockroach into a symbol of defiance

By Rhea Mogul, Esha Mitra, CNN

(CNN) — The spiny, long-legged, and often reviled cockroach has become an unlikely symbol of dissent among India’s Gen Z, in a sharp rebuke to the ruling establishment in the world’s largest democracy.

The Cockroach Janta Party, its name a satirical riff on the incumbent Bharatiya Janata Party, has amassed more than 19 million Instagram followers in less than a week, almost double the government’s audience.

It owes its existence to remarks made by Chief Justice Surya Kant, widely taken as calling the country’s unemployed youth “cockroaches.”

“There are youngsters like cockroaches, they don’t get any employment, they don’t have any place in profession,” he said during a court hearing on May 15.

Kant later clarified he was talking about people who entered certain professions using fake degrees. But the damage was already done in a vast nation where youth unemployment remains stubbornly entrenched.

The remarks ignited a viral protest, and Gen Z flipped the insult into a symbol of pride. AI‑generated images of the party’s virtual cockroach mascot now pepper social media feeds, news channels and newspapers in the country of 1.4 billion.

Though not a formal political party, the Cockroach Janta Party serves as a noisy, youthful forum for airing grievances over soaring youth unemployment, and what they see as political dysfunction and corruption.

“They are raising the issues of the nation,” said Amrita Singh, 21, a student from India’s capital Delhi.

“I believe the (Cockroach Janta Party) started as satire, but I really like the direction it’s going in,” said Sristhi, another student, who only gave her first name. “The youth need a platform where we can put up our demands, because most of the political parties somehow… miss the issues which are actually important.”

CNN has contacted the ruling BJP for a response.

Rebuke to establishment

There’s no doubt the BJP remains incredibly popular.

Often described as the world’s largest political party by membership, it recently expanded its footprint into the state of West Bengal, previously a rare opposition stronghold, further establishing its dominance in the country.

Since the party rose to power in 2014, with Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the helm, critics have accused it of stifling civil liberties and the press, pursuing a Hindu-first agenda, and inflaming religious divisions within India’s secular democracy. The BJP has repeatedly denied such characterizations.

The Cockroach Janta Party references this on its website.

“We do not check religion, caste, or gender,” it says on its sign-up form.

In its manifesto, the Cockroach Janta Party said it will cancel the licenses of “all media houses owned by Ambani and Adani,” referring to two of India’s richest men – Mukesh Ambani and Gautam Adani – who own prominent television channels and are seen as being close to Modi, “to make way for a truly independent media.”

The party’s founder, Abhijeet Dipke, told the Associated Press that “five years ago, nobody was ready to speak up against Modi or the government,” adding that the times are now “changing.”

The political communications strategist and student at Boston University in the United States previously worked with the Aam Aadmi Party, a political outfit born from India’s anti-corruption movement in 2012.

“The youth are really frustrated and the government is not acknowledging their concerns,” Dipke told the news agency.

Supporters of the Cockroach Janta Party also took the discourse offline this week, dressing up as the insect to clean up India’s notoriously polluted Yamuna River in Delhi, according to news reports.

But some young people have also voiced their disapproval, arguing the Cockroach Janta Party is a meme embraced by more privileged youngsters, offering up little in the way of real political solutions.

“It is a section of the urban middle class suddenly discovering that the system they watched brutalise others for years can humiliate them too,” wrote one Instagram user in a post that has gained more than 15,000 likes.

Youth unemployment in focus

In recent years, South Asia has seen a number of youth-led movements against corruption and nepotism.

In 2024, a student-led uprising of tens of millions in Bangladesh helped topple the autocratic government of Sheikh Hasina, forcing her to flee to neighboring India, where she’s been living in self-exile ever since. And in Nepal last year, youth-led activism toppled the previous government, paving the way for rapper turned politician Balendra Shah to be elected to power.

In a statement on social media, Dipke said his party is not comparable to what evolved over there. The youth “understand their constitutional rights and will express their dissent through peaceful democratic means,” he said.

To join the Cockroach Janta Party, members need to be “lazy” and “unemployed” – a tongue-in-cheek response to the chief justice’s comments.

But beyond humor lies a stark reality.

With an average age of 29, India has one of the world’s youngest populations. Its young people are growing increasingly educated and ambitious, but the country is not yet able to reap the potential economic benefits.

A recent report by Azim Premji University in the southern city of Bengaluru found that nearly 40% of graduates aged 25 and younger are unemployed.

“The rapid expansion in the number of graduates has not been matched by commensurate growth in graduate employment,” the report said.

CNN has previously reported that in recent years, a growing number of young Indians have undertaken a perilous and illegal journey out of the country – involving multiple flights and a hazardous trek through the jungles of South America – in an attempt to reach the US border.

The trend speaks to the desperation faced by Indians in the world’s largest democracy and stand in stark contrast to the powerful and robust image that Modi is trying to project on the world stage.

While many have been quick to embrace the Cockroach Janta Party, the pushback hasn’t gone unnoticed.

On Thursday, the Cockroach Janta Party’s X handle was made inaccessible in India, with the platform citing “a legal demand.”

CNN has contacted India’s Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, and X for a response.

Minutes after being taken down, the party emerged with a new handle: Cockroach is Back.

Posting an image of the insect at a podium, its long spiky arm raised in a defiant fist, the caption reads: “You thought you could get rid of us? Lol.”

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