On Tuesday, 2026-10-13, activists Ashutosh Ranka, Saurav Das and Ajinkya Shinde arrived at Jantar Mantar before sunrise. According to Cockroach Janata Party founder Abhijeet Dipke, they carried the national flag, the tiranga, and sought to break the police cordon that had been set up around the site. Their aim was to reclaim a space that had recently been denotified as a permitted location for protests.
Delhi Police intercepted the trio and detained them. Dipke captured the moment on video and shared it on his X account. The footage shows officers seizing Ranka, who was holding the tiranga, while chants of “Bharat Mata ki Jai” can be heard in the background. In his post, Dipke wrote, “Cockroaches with the Tiranga sneaked into Jantar Mantar early this morning before they were picked up by Delhi Police… @AshutoshRanka, @SauravDassss, @AjinkyaCJP along with other team members have been detained.”
As the police moved in, the detained activists and their companions shouted the patriotic slogan “Bharat Mata ki Jai.” The chant underscored their framing of the action as a nationalist act of resistance, even as they were being taken into custody.
This means the authorities had withdrawn the formal permission that previously allowed groups to gather there for demonstrations.
While at Jantar Mantar, the activists raised specific political demands. Ranka later posted the message “Hands Off Jantar Mantar,” while Das, despite being detained, posted a celebratory note saying the site had been reclaimed and urging young people to continue the fight.
Jantar Mantar had recently been denotified as a protest location. This means the authorities had withdrawn the formal permission that previously allowed groups to gather there for demonstrations. The activists’ attempt to break the cordon was therefore a direct challenge to that administrative decision.
Abhijeet Dipke, quoted by ANI, directed criticism at Prime Minister Narendra Modi. He said, “[PM] Narendra Modi does not have a problem with Jantar Mantar as a location; he has a problem with protest. A dictator always has a problem with protest.” In another post on X, Dipke added, “You cannot denotify the resistance, @narendramodi,” framing the police action as an attempt to suppress dissent rather than a neutral enforcement of site rules.
The detention of Ranka, Das and Shinde highlights the ongoing friction between protest organisations and the government’s approach to managing public dissent in Delhi. The incident remains a reference point in debates over the limits of permissible protest and the symbolic value of sites like Jantar Mantar.
