Cockroach Janata Party founder Abhijeet Dipke moves Delhi HC, challenges blocking of X account

Cockroach Janata Party (CJP) founder Abhijeet Dipke moved the Delhi High Court on Monday, challenging the blocking of the X account of the “party”. The writ petition has been filed through advocate Nakul Gandhi of NG Law Chambers, Bar and Bench reported.

Cockroach Janta Party (CJP), a satirical political collective that emerged last week, broke the internet with lakhs of registrations before its X account was suspended in India. The CJP's X handle had 200K followers.

On May 22, the government blocked the CJP's X account, reportedly citing national security reasons.

X usually withholds accounts based on legal demand. Such action is taken if the platform receives a “valid and properly scoped request from an authorised entity” and when “it may be necessary to withhold access to certain content in a particular country from time to time," as per the rules.

Why was CJP's account withheld?

An Indian Express report quoted a senior government official as saying that the X handle of the satirical page Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) was withheld following a directive from the Modi-led Union government after the Intelligence Bureau (IB) raised “national security concerns”.

According to the report, the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) asked X to withhold the satirical account under Section 69 (A) of the Information Technology Act, 2000.

The official added that the input to do so came from IB, as the central agency cited a threat to India's sovereignty.

"The IB believed that the account was posting inflammatory content through its account, which could have jeopardised the country’s national security,” the official told the newspaper on condition of anonymity since the government issues such blocking orders under a confidential framework.

A second government official told the newspaper that the order to withhold the account was sent to the social media platform X when it had gained roughly 90,000 followers.

Later on May 23, the CJP website was also taken down. “The government has taken down our iconic website-http://cockroachjantaparty.org. 10 Lakh cockroaches had signed up on our website has members. 6 Lakh cockroaches had signed a petition to demand the resignation of Dharmendra Pradhan,” Dipke wrote on X.

Dipke also claimed that the CJP's Instagram account was hacked.

Recently, a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) was moved in the Supreme Court seeking legal action against Abhijeet Dipke's “Cockroach Janta Party” over allegations that it misused and commercially exploited verbal observations made by the apex court, according to ANI.

About the CJP

The CJP platform was started as a joke after Chief Justice of India Surya Kant described young, unemployed Indians as ‘like cockroaches.'

The “party” soon became a political movement online and garnered more followers on Instagram than the Bharatiya Janata Party(BJP), the world's biggest political party in terms of physical membership.

The online campaign was started by Dipke on May 16. The CJP’s website, which has now been taken down, satirically declared itself as the “Voice of the Lazy & Unemployed.”

The CJP manifesto demands include demands such as a ban on post-retirement Rajya Sabha seats for chief justices, 50 per cent reservation for women in Parliament without increasing the strength of the house, and a 20-year ban on turncoats.