The Official Manifesto

We, the cockroaches of India — the unemployed, the underemployed, the overeducated and undervalued, the NEET aspirants with leaked papers, the graduates with degrees that lead nowhere, the youth who were promised a "Viksit Bharat" and received instead a Supreme Court bench that calls us parasites — do hereby publish this manifesto.

This document is born not from privilege, but from frustration. Not from funding, but from fury. Not from political ambition, but from a constitutional right that is being systematically ignored: Article 21 of the Indian Constitution — the right to live with dignity.

On 15 May 2026, the Chief Justice of India, while sitting on the highest constitutional bench in the land, chose to describe India's unemployed youth as "cockroaches." In doing so, he did not merely insult 42% of India's graduates who cannot find work — he exposed the contempt with which the system views the very people it has failed.

This manifesto is our response. It is not a joke, even if we deliver it with a smile. It is not a petition, because we are done petitioning. It is a declaration — of five non-negotiable demands, backed by data, supported by 2 lakh+ citizens, and delivered with the stubbornness of the creature we were named after.

Cockroaches have survived for 320 million years. This manifesto intends to outlast every government that ignores it.

— Abhijeet Dipke, Founder & Chief Cockroach, on behalf of the Swarm Council

India has the world's largest youth population — over 600 million people under the age of 25. Yet according to the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE) 2025 data, approximately 42% of graduates under 25 are unemployed. This is not a statistic. It is a national emergency disguised as a policy discussion.

The government spends crores on billboards proclaiming "Viksit Bharat 2047" — a vision for a developed India by 2047. But no billboard has ever employed a single person. No slogan has ever paid rent. No rebranding exercise has ever created a job that didn't exist before the poster was printed.

Meanwhile, the truth is buried. India does not publish regular, transparent unemployment data. The Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS) is released with significant delays. The CMIE, which provides the most up-to-date data, is an independent body — not a government source. The government's own unemployment claims are based on methodologies that count a person working one hour per week as "employed."

WHAT WE DEMAND

A White Paper on Employment — a comprehensive, government-published document that provides real unemployment data, disaggregated by state, age, education level, and sector. Updated quarterly. Made public without RTI filings.

Accountability for employment promises — every government scheme that claimed to create jobs (Mudra, Startup India, Skill India) must publish actual employment numbers versus targets, with third-party verification.

A National Employment Guarantee for graduates — modelled on MGNREGA but designed for educated youth. Minimum stipend for graduates who cannot find employment within 6 months of graduation.

End billboard governance — an independent audit of all government advertising spending, which exceeds ₹10,000 crore annually, to determine how much was spent on actual governance versus publicity.

THE NUMBERS

Read the summary version on our 5 Demands page.

In 2024, 24 lakh students appeared for the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) — the single gateway to medical education in India. Many of these students had spent years preparing, invested lakhs in coaching, and sacrificed their adolescence at the altar of a single examination.

Then the papers leaked. The NEET paper leak scandal revealed that the question papers for the most important medical entrance exam in the country had been compromised — sold to middlemen, distributed before the exam, and used by certain candidates to secure unfair advantages. The scale of the leak was staggering. Multiple states were affected. The integrity of the entire examination was in question.

The government's response? Deflection. Delayed investigations. Political blame-shifting. No minister resigned. No systemic overhaul was announced. The message to 24 lakh students was clear: your years of preparation don't matter as much as our political convenience.

But the educational crisis extends beyond NEET. The CBSE charges ₹500-1,000 per subject for answer sheet rechecking — essentially creating a financial barrier to challenging potentially erroneous evaluation. Students from economically weaker backgrounds cannot afford to question their results. This is not an examination system; it is a revenue model built on student anxiety.

WHAT WE DEMAND

Full criminal accountability for the NEET paper leak — from the printing press to the middlemen to any official who enabled it. Not a committee report. Prosecutions.

Resignation of the Education Minister — the minister in charge when a national exam is compromised must take responsibility, not deflect it.

Abolish CBSE rechecking fees — evaluation is the Board's responsibility. If their evaluation is wrong, correction should be free. No student should pay to prove the system made an error.

Independent examination authority — a body fully independent of the Education Ministry, with its own security protocols, to conduct all national examinations. Modelled on the Election Commission's independence.

India ranks 159th out of 180 countries on the World Press Freedom Index (Reporters Without Borders, 2025). This is not a fringe claim by an opposition party — it is an internationally recognised, independently verified assessment of the state of journalism in the world's largest democracy.

For over 12 years, no sitting Prime Minister of India has held a single unscripted press conference where independent journalists can ask questions, follow up, and demand answers. The only communication channel is Mann Ki Baat — a one-way monthly radio address where the PM speaks and the nation listens, but never the other way around.

In the world's largest democracy, the elected leader does not answer questions from the press. He answers questions from himself. This is not governance. This is a monologue masquerading as democracy.

Meanwhile, journalists who ask inconvenient questions face tax raids, sedition charges (before its partial dilution), UAPA detention, and social media harassment coordinated at industrial scale. Independent media outlets face advertising boycotts. Critical coverage leads to regulatory action. The fourth estate has been systematically converted into a fourth wall.

WHAT WE DEMAND

Monthly PM press conferences — unscripted, open to accredited independent journalists, with mandatory follow-up questions. Broadcast live and unedited.

End misuse of UAPA and sedition provisions against journalists — no journalist should face terror charges for doing their job.

Independent media tribunal — a body to investigate government interference in editorial independence, with the power to impose consequences.

On 15 May 2026, the Chief Justice of India Surya Kant compared India's unemployed youth to "cockroaches" — calling them parasites who attack the system that feeds them. This remark was made from the highest constitutional bench in the country, during a hearing on a PIL about unemployment.

This was not a casual comment. It was a judicial statement, made on record, in open court, by the head of the Indian judiciary. It dehumanised millions of citizens who are unemployed not by choice, but because the system — the very system the judiciary is sworn to uphold — has failed to create opportunities for them.

Article 21 of the Indian Constitution guarantees every citizen the right to live with dignity. The Supreme Court itself has, in multiple landmark judgements, interpreted Article 21 to include the right to live with human dignity. When the CJI calls citizens "cockroaches," he violates the very principle his court has established.

Unemployment is not a character flaw. It is a policy failure. When a country with the world's largest youth population cannot provide employment to 42% of its graduates, the failure belongs to the policymakers, the administrators, and the institutions — not to the citizens who are its victims.

WHAT WE DEMAND

A formal apology from CJI Surya Kant for the cockroach remark — not a clarification, not a "taken out of context" statement, but a genuine acknowledgment that the remark was dehumanising and unconstitutional.

A code of conduct for judicial speech — binding guidelines on how judges, especially the CJI, address citizens in open court. No citizen should be compared to insects by the institution meant to protect them.

Judicial accountability mechanism — a transparent, citizen-accessible system to file complaints about judicial conduct, with mandatory review timelines and public outcomes.

This is the demand that birthed the Cockroach Janata Party. If this remark had never been made, CJP would not exist. Its existence is proof of how deeply this wound cuts.

In March 2020, as COVID-19 swept across India, the government established the PM CARES Fund — the Prime Minister's Citizen Assistance and Relief in Emergency Situations Fund. Citizens, corporations, and public sector undertakings poured money into it. The total amount collected: approximately ₹10,990 crore (over $1.3 billion USD).

Now, here is what we know about how that money was spent: nothing.

The PM CARES Fund has provided zero responses to RTI (Right to Information) requests. It is not audited by the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG). It is not subject to parliamentary oversight. It is not classified as a government fund despite being named after the Prime Minister and using the Prime Minister's office for collections. It exists in a governance vacuum — collecting money from citizens in the name of emergency relief while operating with zero accountability.

This is not a partisan issue. This is a fundamental question of democratic governance: when the government collects money from citizens during a national emergency, citizens have the right to know exactly how every rupee was spent.

WHAT WE DEMAND

Full public audit of PM CARES Fund — conducted by the CAG and published in full, showing every rupee collected and every rupee spent, with beneficiary details and project outcomes.

Bring PM CARES under RTI Act — any fund collecting public money must be subject to public scrutiny. No exceptions.

Parliamentary committee oversight — a standing committee dedicated to reviewing PM CARES expenditure, with quarterly public reports and opposition participation.

Publish all PSU contributions — every public sector undertaking that contributed to PM CARES must publish the amount, source (whether from profits or employee deductions), and whether the contribution was voluntary or directed.