Delhi police removed hunger-striking activist Sonam Wangchuk from a New Delhi protest site on Saturday and took him to a hospital, a move police said followed a court order over his deteriorating health but that his fellow protesters described as a forceful crackdown.
The Delhi deputy commissioner of police wrote on social media platform X that Wangchuk had been shifted to Safdarjung Hospital for “essential medical care” in line with High Court orders and medical advice, after 21 days without food. The post said protesters at the scene had briefly tried to obstruct the operation but that officers used restraint and carried out the transfer safely, and police subsequently asked remaining demonstrators to vacate the historic Jantar Mantar protest ground.
Leaders of the youth-led Cockroach Janta Party, which has camped at the site with Wangchuk, gave a different account. The group posted video on Instagram showing plainclothes men moving onto the stage where Wangchuk had been resting, supporters attempting to block them, and officers unfurling white sheets to shield the detention from view. CJP founder Abhijeet Dipke, who said he was kept away from the site by police during the operation, said he had been beaten and detained himself. He later announced the group would escalate its central demand. “Until now, we were demanding Dharmendra Pradhan’s resignation, but after this despicable act, we will now demand the resignation of Narendra Modi,” Dipke told the press agency ANI, vowing the group’s planned march from Jantar Mantar to Parliament would still proceed July 20.
Wangchuk, a 59-year-old engineer and education reformer, had been fasting since June 28 in support of the CJP’s campaign against Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan over alleged leaks and irregularities in the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test, a medical college admission exam that affected millions of students. Dipke said Wangchuk had lost about 8.7 kilograms, or roughly 19 pounds, as of Friday and appeared visibly weak with significant muscle loss. Asked that day whether he wanted to be hospitalized, Wangchuk said: “This is not a disease or a disorder. This is a self chosen fast.”
The Delhi High Court had directed the city and federal governments earlier in the week to monitor Wangchuk’s health and provide urgent medical care if needed, after an advocate filed a petition asking the court to order intravenous feeding to keep him alive, citing past cases in which protesters were given supplements and nutrients under court order. The court did not rule on the force-feeding request directly. Wangchuk’s wife has said any medical treatment should require his consent.
The advocacy group Hindus for Human Rights had urged the Indian government earlier in the week to engage directly with Wangchuk and other protesters on hunger strike rather than let the standoff continue. The NEET exam at the center of the dispute is administered nationally each year to determine admission to India’s medical colleges, and allegations that this year’s question papers leaked in advance prompted the protests along with reports that some affected students later died by suicide.
The Cockroach Janta Party formed in May after India’s Supreme Court Chief Justice, Surya Kant, compared some unemployed young people to cockroaches during an unrelated hearing; the group’s supporters adopted the term rather than reject it. Its demands have grown to include an overhaul of India’s examination system and compensation for the families of students who died by suicide over the exam controversy, in addition to Pradhan’s resignation.
Opposition politicians condemned Saturday’s operation. Trinamool Congress lawmaker Sagarika Ghosh wrote on X that the government “only knows how to use the danda,” using a Hindi term for a police baton, and called the action unacceptable. Shiv Sena (UBT) leader Sanjay Raut and Communist Party of India (Marxist) general secretary M.A. Baby also criticized the police action in separate statements.
Wangchuk has led hunger strikes before, most recently earlier this year over demands for statehood for the Himalayan territory of Ladakh, a campaign he suspended after protests in the city of Leh turned violent and several people were killed; he was briefly arrested afterward. Hunger strikes remain a widely used form of peaceful protest in India, a tactic associated historically with Mahatma Gandhi.
The march from Jantar Mantar to Parliament remains scheduled for July 20, according to CJP organizers, and the Delhi High Court’s order requiring authorities to monitor Wangchuk’s health remains in effect.
