Don't protest much against legit protest

'Cockroach Janta Party' (CJP) founder Abhijeet Dipke is scheduled to return to India this Saturday. He's called for a peaceful demonstration upon arrival in New Delhi demanding the resignation of Union education minister Dharmendra Pradhan. This is a perfectly legit request. While the Pavlovian response of state machineries - whether central or state - is to clamp down, it would behove GoI to let liberal democracy do its thing. Even (especially?) when such a show of dissent, within the confines of law and constitution, is against it.

Dipke's shout-out is a direct fallout of systemic rot. The Indian state can ignore - or, worse, clamp it down - at its own reputational risk. The utter failure of intensely competitive examinations - NEET, CBSE, CUET, SSC-GD - has left over 10 mn students staring into space. Backed by a petition signed by 8 lakh citizens, Dipke's plan to march from Delhi airport to Parliament Street police station is born of genuine grievance. Exam chaos has upended career timelines, inflicted crushing financial strain on ordinary families, and pushed a batch into avoidable mental stress. Predictably, since CJP's inception - sparked by a remark from CJI comparing unemployed, vocal youth on social media to 'cockroaches' - many have dismissed it as a foreign conspiracy or an Opposition-orchestrated plot. This line of thinking is both self-defeatingly circular and obsolete.

A modern liberal democracy needs to understand that people, especially its young, can - and do - have agency. Not every wave of public disaffection is a sinister plot. Today's youth, aided by social media, should articulate grievances and, if they wish, demand changes. Denying them a voice only weakens the very democracy that 'card-holding' patriots wish to promulgate.