A day after Prime Minister Narendra Modi said that he wanted to forgive the students who allegedly made abusive remarks about him, Cockroach Janta Party founder Abhijeet Dipke on Saturday asked whether Modi would also “seek forgiveness for the brutal lathi-charge on students”. In a video posted on social media, Dipke said that if Modi uploads another video, he hopes that the prime minister would apologise for the police action that took place during the march to Parliament on July 20. Dipke also alleged that during the lathi-charge, “12-year-old girls were hit on the head by the police”. Will PM Modi seek forgiveness for the brutal lathi-charge on students? pic.twitter.com/4HtYoksu0E— Abhijeet Dipke (@abhijeet_dipke) August 1, 2026
“Women’s clothes were torn by male police officers. They also hit girls on their private parts,” Dipke said.Modi, in a video posted on social media on Friday, had said that “some mischievous children used abusive language that doesn’t dignify any civilised society.”The prime minister had appealed for restraint from the public, saying that making the student protesters run around courts would not provide solutions to problems.“I want to forgive them,” Modi had said. “The children are ours and we have to show them the right path even if it is difficult to do for people who have been misled,” he added.Modi’s video message, the fifth in a week, came a day after a 15-year-old girl in Noida was booked for making purportedly objectionable remarks about him on social media during the youth protests at Jantar Mantar.A first information report was registered against Ruchika Singh under sections of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita pertaining to intentional insult to provoke breach of peace, statements conducing to public mischief and defamation. The FIR was based on a complaint by a Ghaziabad resident.On Friday, Singh apologised for the remarks she had made about the prime minister.The Cockroach Janta Party, which led the youth protests, said that the “misuse of criminal machinery” against Singh was unacceptable. “Harassment of the young must stop immediately,” a spokesperson said on Friday.The Hyderabad Police also registered cases against technology firm Meta’s India head, and several Facebook and Instagram accounts over purportedly objectionable videos and photographs of Modi shared on the two social media platforms during the protests.The content was posted online during the youth protests demanding the resignation of Dharmendra Pradhan, the Union education minister at the time on account of alleged irregularities in the conduct of competitive exams.On July 20, thousands joined the protest in Delhi two days after the police forcibly took activist Sonam Wangchuk, who had been on a hunger strike for three weeks, to hospital. Their march to Parliament was met with a crackdown by the police. Dozens were injured as the police used lathis, fired tear gas shells and pellet guns against the demonstrators.The police action turbocharged the agitation, which spread to other parts of the country.Written by Anamika Pathak. Edited by Neerad Pandharipande.
