Uploaded July 2026 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
A youth-led protest movement in India is demanding an end to the country’s status quo. Sparked by the leak of national exam questions, tens of thousands of young people have taken to the streets.
Although the protesters’ initial demands were for the resignation of the country’s education minister, “everything has shifted to directly attacking [Prime Minister Narendra] Modi,” says Indian writer Arundhati Roy, who says the erosion of democratic principles under Modi’s right-wing Bharatiya Janata (Indian People’s) Party is being contested on a large scale for the first time.
A youth-led protest movement in India is demanding an end to the country’s status quo. Sparked by the leak of national exam questions, tens of thousands of young people have taken to the streets.
Although the protesters’ initial demands were for the resignation of the country’s education minister, “everything has shifted to directly attacking [Prime Minister Narendra] Modi,” says Indian writer Arundhati Roy, who says the erosion of democratic principles under Modi’s right-wing Bharatiya Janata (Indian People’s) Party is being contested on a large scale for the first time.
