Sonam Wangchuk, the engineer and environmentalist whose 26-day hunger strike became a catalyst for India's "Cockroach" youth protest movement, is now turning his attention to cleansing the country's political system. His fast, which began on 28 June, is widely credited with helping to transform the movement into one of the most significant challenges to Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government in over a decade.
A Fast That Shook the Nation
Wangchuk's hunger strike, held in solidarity with the Cockroach movement, saw him lose 11kg over 26 days. The movement was launched in May after a key nationwide medical college entrance exam was cancelled due to a paper leak, devastating the 2 million students who had already sat the test. A dozen of those students reportedly took their own lives.
The movement's name derives from comments by India's chief justice, Surya Kant, who compared some unemployed young people to cockroaches and parasites during a court hearing. Abhijit Dipke, the movement's founder, demanded the resignation of education minister Dharmendra Pradhan over the leak, a call that resonated widely and sparked nationwide protests.
From Protest to Victory
After weeks of deadlock and an unprecedented police crackdown that swayed public opinion in the protesters' favour, Pradhan resigned on 25 July. Dipke acknowledged Wangchuk's crucial role, noting that the hunger strike, which began on a stage at the Delhi protest site, reinvigorated a movement whose crowds had been thinning.
Wangchuk, who was already a respected figure for his work on educational reform and environmental protection, endured harsh conditions during his fast, lying outdoors in Delhi's heat and humidity. He described the experience to the Guardian: "I felt confined, trapped … like a prison. The heat and humidity were awful."
A Call for Political Reform
Now, Wangchuk is focusing on rebuilding his health, having regained about 60% of his previous weight, while continuing to advocate for political change. In a video message before India's independence day in August, he called for a "second independence movement" and urged Indians to choose leaders of "character and substance."
He has asked people to share names of individuals of integrity, planning to meet them in Mumbai and Delhi to discuss how to remove those with criminal backgrounds from elections. "Indians have to trust those at the top," he said. "At the moment, there is no trust in anything, not in elections, not in exams, not in civil servants. Clean and honest leaders are the first step to a better future."
Wangchuk also supported the Cockroach movement's decision to remain a pressure group rather than form a political party, advising that this approach keeps it "clean and neutral." He now lives quietly in Ladakh, where he dreams of the apricots he missed during his fast. "I did dream of apricots," he said, "but that was just because I was wondering if mine back home had ripened."
