All roads to Jantar Mantar

The protest against the Citizenship Amendment Act, which sought to ‘divide’ the country along religious lines, launched by student movements at Jantar Mantar in Delhi in the first week of December 2019 under the banner of ‘United Against Hate’, spread across the country rapidly. When student protesters, despite the government’s efforts to suppress the demonstrations in Aligarh, Jamia Millia Islamia and Delhi University through baton charges and aiming guns, refused to back down, mainstream political parties, human rights organisations and civil society joined the protest as one. The ‘inauguration’ of that mass protest was also held at Jantar Mantar.  On December 19, people from across India flocked there and ignited a new popular struggle against the central government.  What followed — the emergence of Shaheen Baghs across the country, the Sangh Parivar’s ‘Goli Maro Saalon Ko’ slogans against the protesters, the Delhi genocide and the government’s suppression of protests under the pretext of Covid — is all history. Is that history repeating itself once again? For India is once again heading towards Jantar Mantar today (10 October), albeit in a different political context. If the protest back then was against the fascist actions of the central government, backed by a massive parliamentary majority, young people and students are now heading to Jantar Mantar now, raising the slogan ‘Chalo Delhi’, as part of a popular movement against the government’s attempt to bring the Election Commission under its control and undermine democracy itself. The fact that the opposition alliance has united with the protesters, setting aside political differences, is no small matter. As usual, the government has also begun displaying its authoritarian thrust a day in advance. The police appear to be trying to prevent protesters from reaching Jantar Mantar by cutting off internet access and closing metro stations in Delhi. At the same time, authorities are arresting student leaders and human rights activists in various parts of the country. However, the protesters have also made it clear that they will not yield to threats.

This movement demanding the resignation of Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar did not emerge overnight.   The question how independent is the Election Commission has been before us for years. By subverting the process of appointing members to the Election Commission itself, the Modi government has ensured that even the selection of a person to head a constitutional body that should function with complete independence is now based on political allegiance. In fact, the opposition contested the recent Lok Sabha elections amid suspicions arising from this subservience. Even after performing fairly well in the elections, Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi and his team continued to raise these suspicions, citing evidence. These suspicions were reinforced when Rahul Gandhi presented evidence of vote-rigging at a press conference on August 7, 2025. Forty days later, when he disclosed further details of the alleged ‘vote-rigging’, the credibility of the Election Commission itself came under question. Through those two press conferences, the Opposition demonstrated how the Central Election Commission had colluded with the government to undermine popular will through the electoral process. The revelations exposed how software had been used to remove many people from the voter list without their knowledge. Remember that this happened while the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls was under way in Bihar and West Bengal. Naturally, the SIR was also viewed as part of the alleged vote-rigging process. While all this remained a major political allegation, serious charges against Gyanesh Kumar made by two members of the Commission came to light. The crux of the allegations was that Gyanesh had sabotaged the Commission’s work relating to the SIR process. This is how isolated protests against the Commission took a unified form, leading to the popular uprising we are witnessing now. As the flames of protest reach Jantar Mantar today, the movement can be expected to mark a new phase of history.

Meanwhile, a crucial intervention by the Supreme Court has come up before the country.  Gyanesh Kumar’s argument was that one of the Commission’s most controversial steps in the SIR process had received the Supreme Court’s approval. The Commission had introduced certain changes to Form 6, which is used to add names to the voter list, resulting in many people being disqualified. For a long time, the Commission and Gyanesh Kumar had maintained that these changes had been made with the Supreme Court’s approval. However, the Supreme Court set the record straight: a bench headed by Chief Justice Suryakant clarified that the court had never approved the revised Form 6. With that, the claim was debunked.  This naturally raises the question under whose connivance and for whose benefit this change was made.  This question is now being echoed in the protest slogans. We will certainly know the answer in the coming days. Until then, let this struggle continue.