Dhruv Rathee in Custody | Delhi / Hyderabad, Oct. 10: Police took YouTuber Dhruv Rathee into custody on Saturday as Delhi Police moved to stop a youth protest demanding the resignation of Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar. A police spokesperson said those detained outside Delhi included Rathee, a popular figure on YouTube who supports the protest.
Police detained scores of protesters in the capital amid patrols by thousands of security personnel. Travel and telecom links were suspended in what amounted to a lockdown. About 200 protesters were held in the area, a police source told Reuters.
Television images showed police in New Delhi’s central business district chasing a few dozen young protesters, some wearing backpacks. Police then loaded them into vehicles and drove them away.
Rathee had appeared at a protest in Bengaluru on October 8, where he showed people a copy of an SIR investigation report. That protest also demanded Kumar’s resignation.
Metro stations and markets were shut, and mobile internet was suspended. Reuters witnesses said police stopped people at the city’s entry points and boarded buses to check for protesters. Officers also checked cars and other vehicles.
Barricades and concrete blocks stopped traffic. Anti-riot vehicles mounted with tear gas guns stood on key routes.
Abhijeet Dipke, founder of the Cockroach Janta Party (CJP), which called the protest, spoke to the ANI news agency in Mumbai shortly before leaving for Delhi. “Why is the prime minister so scared of the country’s youth, the country’s people?” he asked. He questioned why railways, the metro, the internet and roads had been closed, calling it “nothing but fear.”
Protesters planned to gather at 10 am at Jantar Mantar, the protest site authorities have designated in central Delhi.
Dhruv Rathee | Why the Jantar Mantar protest was called
The CJP has described the protest as an effort to “Save Democracy”. It is planned as the biggest in a series of demonstrations launched last week. They began after the Indian Express reported that Kumar’s deputies had queried and disagreed with him over voter list revisions that dropped about 130 million voters. That figure is larger than Japan’s population.
Opposition parties have long accused the government of trying to fix voter lists to its advantage and revived the allegation after the report. They say the deletions affected the outcome of some recent state elections won by the BJP, and that this has cast a shadow on the electoral process. The protesters accuse the BJP of using the revision to sway results, in collusion with its appointees in the Election Commission, including Kumar.
Kumar has not commented. The Election Commission and the BJP have denied the allegations. The BJP says Modi’s popularity and India’s economic growth explain its electoral dominance, and it accuses opposition parties of misleading the country because they cannot win elections.
The Election Commission’s data, which the BJP also cites, shows about 130 million names deleted during the verification exercise. These include 63 million who relocated, 30 million who could not be traced and 28 million who died. The commission says the count covers entries flagged at the draft revision stage. It says the exercise is not complete and that wrongly removed voters can enrol again.
The near daily protests pose a new political challenge to Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Just months ago, similar demonstrations forced his education minister to quit over exam paper leaks. They also come months before a series of key state elections from early 2027, including one in Uttar Pradesh, the most populous state, which the BJP rules.
On Friday, Delhi Police said they had not given permission for the protest and that violators would face the force of the law. They described their curbs as “temporary and precautionary”. According to police, the curbs aim to regulate movement, prevent overcrowding, maintain public order and ensure the safety of protesters and others. CJP leaders rejected the decision and said they would go ahead, calling the protest their fundamental right.
Now you can get the latest stories from Indtoday on Telegram every day. Click the link to subscribe. Click to follow Indtoday’s Facebook page, Twitter, and Instagram. For all the latest Hyderabad News updates and Follow us on GoogleNews
