A massive security deployment of over 60,000 personnel in Delhi successfully thwarted a planned protest by the Cockroach Janta Party at Jantar Mantar by utilizing heavy barricades, transport restrictions, and internet suspensions, though the resulting shutdowns effectively paralyzed parts of the capital for a day and raised questions about the long-term containment of public angst.

A massive security deployment of over 60,000 personnel in Delhi successfully thwarted a planned protest by the Cockroach Janta Party at Jantar Mantar by utilizing heavy barricades, transport restrictions, and internet suspensions, though the resulting shutdowns effectively paralyzed parts of the capital for a day and raised questions about the long-term containment of public angst.

A massive security deployment of over 60,000 personnel in Delhi successfully thwarted a planned protest by the Cockroach Janta Party at Jantar Mantar by utilizing heavy barricades, transport restrictions, and internet suspensions, though the resulting shutdowns effectively paralyzed parts of the capital for a day and raised questions about the long-term containment of public angst.

For the first few hours on the morning of October 10, all roads in the national capital seemed to lead to Jantar Mantar. The entire country’s eyes were riveted on a 4 km radius zone with the 17th-century Jantar Mantar in the centre. The air had an ominous ring of something overwhelming about to happen. But an unprecedented security blanket, comprising more than 60,000 personnel from the Delhi Police, neighbouring states, and paramilitary forces, thwarted the Cockroach Janta Party’s (CJP) plans to stage a protest.

THE WEEK’s team tried to penetrate the police barricades but had to ultimately abandon the plan about 200 metres short of the central protest venue at Jantar Mantar. That in itself would have been an achievement of sorts, with thick police barricades every 200-300 metres inside the 4 km radius area. In the process, one of THE WEEK’s journalists was also detained by the police and taken to a police station on Delhi’s outskirts along with the protesters.

The protesters tried to activate Plan B by setting up small pockets of resistance in the numerous nodes that led to Jantar Mantar. Meanwhile, three important CJP leaders—Abhijeet Dipke, Saurav Das, and Ashutosh Ranka—were detained by a Delhi Police team as soon as their aircraft landed in Delhi.

But the minor incidents of face-offs between the police and the protesters were surprising not in their intensity, which was slight, but in their extent and spread within the 4 km radius area. There were reports of scuffles from Parliament Street, near Minto Bridge, Connaught Place, from the Bangla Sahib area, and many other places.

On October 9, the administration suspended internet services within the 4 km radius area, besides announcing transport restrictions including the shutdown of 57 Metro stations that was reduced to 45 later, forcing the Supreme Court to issue an order ruling that the authorities must not cause any hardship or suffering to ordinary commuters through a blanket ban.

As a result, the streets of central Delhi wore an unusually deserted look. But in the stark emptiness and desolation of Delhi’s streets may lie the success of the protesters. They managed to shut down the capital for a day.

More significantly, what remains to be seen is whether the strong police action has succeeded in containing and absorbing the prevalent angst, whether it has been able to restrain it for some time, or whether the anger now spills out into newer geographies.

There is a feeling among many that the government’s heavy clampdown effort may not fetch the desired results. What it could have done for starters was to rope in the political Opposition, bring it onto the same page, and then approach the motley leadership of the protesters. That could have helped defuse the situation for the moment.

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