Actor Amol Parashar has revealed that he quietly attended the Cockroach Janta Party’s (CJP) Chalo Sansad protest at Delhi’s Jantar Mantar on July 20, calling it an experience that continues to haunt him. Reflecting on the events, the actor said he cried himself to sleep, unable to stop thinking about the students who may have returned home with broken limbs and shattered spirits.
Event Context
On Tuesday, Amol took to Instagram to pen down his feelings and emotions after joining the Chalo Sansad protest in Delhi on Monday.
He called it “a day I will never forget” and explained what compelled him to join the protest, what he witnessed before and after the police action, and why the incident left him questioning the way the country’s youth were being treated.
Looking back at the hours before the police action, Amol said the atmosphere was marked by hope and optimism rather than anger.
“The night before I saw groups of young people with dreams and hopes in their eyes, smiling, singing songs, asking questions, holding each other’s hands through the heavy crowd. Having grown up in Delhi, I know the reputation that place has for safety of women. But in spite of a crowd tightly packed shoulder to shoulder, there was not a single moment of misbehaviour or unruliness, not a single bad touch,” Amol recalled.
Amol admitted that he also noticed young people taking responsibility for one another, writing, “In a country where people hardly clean up after themselves, these young people decided to take responsibility for other people as well. Made no noise about it, just took accountability, assumed responsibility and quietly went about this selfless task.”
Looking back at the emotional experience, Amol wrote, “I cried myself to sleep last night. Thinking about those who must have reached home with broken limbs and spirit, finally with network on their phones, and opened it to see that they had been called Pakistanis, paid agents, Chinese agents, foreign hands by their own fellow countrymen.”
Amol wondered if the students cried after reading what was being projected for them, sharing, “Did it kill every sliver of hope in their young spirits? Maybe some of them have already resolved in their minds that they will get ot of this country the first chance they get. And that day they would have revealed and proven themselves to be what they always were: foreign agents.”
Player Focus
On Monday, police personnel used lathi-charge and tear gas shells, with the CJP alleging brutality and accusing the security personnel of “attacking” a truck which was carrying Abhijeet Dipke, activist Sonam Wangchuk’s wife Gitanjali J Angmo, and actors Shabana Azmi and Prakash Raj. Around 50,000 protesters had taken to the streets on Monday to demand the resignation of union education minister Dharmendra Pradhan.
The protest march, which began in a peaceful manner with protesters carrying flowers for police personnel, saw the main protest stage being dismantled by the cops by late afternoon and protesters being cleared from Jantar Mantar. The Delhi Police, meanwhile, accused protesters of displaying “unruly, aggressive and violent behaviour” during the march and accused them of attacking security personnel, damaging government vehicles and public property.
Team Analysis
In his post, the actor revealed that he had quietly joined the protest without telling anyone, choosing to stand alongside the students “as nothing but a fellow citizen.”
Responding to those who claimed the students were being manipulated by outside forces, he wrote with biting sarcasm, “Who taught them this mutual respect? Must be some foreign influence, because our previous generations only taught us to look out for ourselves in this dog-eat-dog world.”
He added, “They were not all NEET aspirants. That’s true. Most of them were from other fields of study, various colleges, streams, courses so I was pretty sure if I asked them the full form of NEET, some would stumble. Some were too young or too old to be directly affected by NEET. What was their motivation to be there then? Which foreign influence was making them care about other people who they didn’t know personally? Which foreign influence is trying to make sure that exams are fair in our country and our elected leaders are accountable to the public?”
Match Outlook
The actor began his note with, “I was at Jantar Mantar on 20th July, 2026. A day I will never forget. Why did I go? There was a deep itch within me for the last 3-4 days which I just couldn’t shake off. Being brought up in a middle-class Indian household the value and importance of education is not lost on me. A fair and competent system to support young talent being an important part of nation building and society building, is not lost on me.”
The actor also revealed that the messages he received from students in the days leading up to the protest, filled with “love, respect and hope”, left him deeply emotional and brought him to tears time and again.
Amol said he intentionally kept his participation low-key, choosing not to announce his presence or turn the protest into a public spectacle, adding, “I just wanted to be there for these young kids, stand with them, stand among them – as nothing but a fellow citizen. I did not want to be recognised, I didn’t want any stage or camera, didn’t want to make a speech or reel, because I didn’t want it to be about me. I wanted to listen to them.”
“A few of them still recognised me even with the mask, sunglasses and cap (I don’t know how) but they just smiled and shook my hands, gave me fist bumps, thanked me (I don’t know for what) completely respecting my choice of privacy. Who taught them these manners? Must be some foreign influence because the previous generations hardly knew these things,” added the actor.
Amol argued that the true purpose of education is not just to acquire knowledge, but also to adopt independent thinking. “As much as education is about knowledge and skill, it is also about critical and independent thinking. Even personally, the latter things I have had to develop myself, our formal education lacking those aspects. Now we are taking away knowledge and skill from the game too. So what book are they reading that is teaching them all this? Must be some foreign propaganda. And then suddenly, dark clouds descended on their world. The state decided that it had had enough of these foreign influenced children and decided to break their heads, so these ideas could escape from the hole in their skull,” wrote the actor.
Amol went on to look back at seeing injured students, writing, “Young people bleeding on the road, their friends crying for help. Some just shocked and in disbelief, asking the cops ‘hum aapke bacche nahi hain kya?’. They came asking for better education, they left with a harsh lesson: no one cares about you.”
The actor admitted the experience haunted him long after he returned home. “Yesterday I learnt what is worse than the intense burning of eyes and the terrible taste of tear gas in your throat. The state of helplessness you feel when you see evil unfold right in front of your eyes, and you can do nothing to stop it. What is the future of a state that makes its youth feel so small, so humiliated, so insignificant. Like a pest being crushed and swatted away,” Amol shared.
‘To all the young people: I wish I could hug each one of you and tell you that you are loved, you are cherished, you are appreciated. And I want to thank you for teaching me some lessons: hold each other’s hands, respect each other, comfort each other if needed, clean up after yourself, clean up after other people, don’t be ashamed to ask for your rights, never stop appealing for humanity,” he wrote while ending his note.
The CJP has been protesting at Jantar Mantar since June 6, demanding the resignation of Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan. Climate activist Sonam Wangchuk also joined the protest and went on an indefinite hunger strike. On July 20, protesters marched towards Parliament as part of the Chalo Sansad campaign, drawing support from several public figures, including Shabana Azmi, Prakash Raj, Hanumankind and Amol Parashar.
