Founder of India’s youth-led Cockroach Janata Party (CJP), Abhijeet Dipke, was released from detention on Saturday, a day after he was arrested during a police crackdown on protests against the country’s election authority. Dipke, 31, was detained in New Delhi on Friday while on his way to join a rally…...
Founder of India’s youth-led Cockroach Janata Party (CJP), Abhijeet Dipke, was released from detention on Saturday, a day after he was arrested during a police crackdown on protests against the country’s election authority.
Dipke, 31, was detained in New Delhi on Friday while on his way to join a rally organised by the CJP movement in the capital’s central Connaught Place district.
An AFP photographer saw Dipke leave a police station on Saturday afternoon, waving to journalists and giving a thumbs-up as he was driven away.
“Abhijeet Dipke released,” CJP legal affairs chief Ratna Singh said on social media.
Opposition parties and CJP activists have defied a security crackdown, rallying to demand the resignation of India’s chief election commissioner after accusing the poll body of manipulating voter rolls to benefit Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ruling party.
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The commission, which oversees voting in the world’s most populous nation, has denied any wrongdoing.
Two other senior CJP leaders, Ashutosh Ranka and Saurav Das, were arrested on October 14 after entering Jantar Mantar, a decades-old protest site that police have declared off-limits for demonstrations. They remain in custody.
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“Now just waiting for my brothers to be free”, Dipke said in a post on X that included a photo of Ranka and Das.
In a separate post on Instagram, Dipke said he “knew going to jail was inevitable” and that he was ready to face “whatever comes my way”.
“Because the day I decided to come back to India, I placed my fate in the hands of the people of India and the Constitution of this country.”
Members of Modi’s Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) have long alleged that large numbers of undocumented Muslim migrants from neighbouring Bangladesh have fraudulently entered India’s electoral rolls.
Rights groups and critics however say the Modi government has eroded democratic freedoms during more than a decade in power, citing pressure on journalists, civil society groups and political opponents — allegations the government rejects.
AFP