Police summon India's cockroach party leaders hours after their release from jail

Hind Al Soulia - Riyadh - NEW DELHI — Two leaders of the youth-led Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) were summoned by the Delhi police on Thursday, hours after they were released from jail following a court order.

Saurav Das and Ashutosh Ranka walked out of Tihar jail after a court ordered their release. They were detained and jailed a week ago after they crossed barricades and climbed over police barricades at the Jantar Mantar protest site in Delhi.

The Crime Branch issued notices to Das and Ranka asking them to appear for questioning at the Rajouri Garden office by noon on Thursday.

The investigation pertains to allegations of trespassing at Jantar Mantar after it was denotified as a protest site, obstructing police personnel on duty, and disobedience of a government order, among other charges.

The summons came a day after the Delhi Police transferred two cases against the CJP leaders to the Crime Branch, citing the sensitive nature of the cases and the need for an impartial investigation.

On Wednesday, a special magistrate ordered that Das and Ranka be released, despite efforts by police to keep them in prison. They were made to sign a bond pledging no further breach of peace.

Their arrest came after a draconian police crackdown on a CJP march held in the capital two weeks ago to protest alleged manipulation of the country’s electoral roll, which led to the barricading of central Delhi and thousands of young people being detained.

The historic venue was recently removed from a list of designated protest sites.

The men, who denied wrongdoing, have been calling on India's chief election commissioner to resign. Critics accuse the commission of manipulating voter rolls to benefit India's governing party, charges the commission rejects.

A special executive magistrate court in Delhi passed their release order, legal news website Bar and Bench reported.

After bail was granted, Das told reporters from a police van: "Truth alone triumphs. Long live the revolution."

Das and Ranka are key leaders of the CJP, which began as an internet joke in May after India's top judge compared unemployed young people to "cockroaches".

The CJP is not a registered political party, but a collective which began by mobilising thousands of young people to protest over leaked exam papers.

By July it had emerged as a major force.

A march towards parliament that month ended in clashes with police, drawing wider attention to the movement and increasing pressure on the government. The unrest eventually led to the resignation of India's education minister.

The CJP has since shifted its focus to India's electoral system.

Along with opposition parties, students and other critics of the government, it accuses Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Gyanesh Kumar of revising electoral rolls, an exercise known as the Special Intensive Revision (SIR), to benefit Prime Minister Narendra Modi's governing Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

Both the BJP and the Election Commission have rejected the allegation.

The SIR exercise has resulted in around 130 million names being removed from voter lists since last year.

Critics warn that the process could also exclude eligible voters, potentially denying them their right to vote, while the Election Commission says the exercise is intended to remove ineligible, dead and duplicate entries.