Mohammad Adeeb, a former member of Parliament and now chairman of Indian Muslims for Civil Rights (IMCR), has rejected the allegation that Indian Muslims are not participating in the ongoing agitation led by the Cockroach Janata Party (CJP) in Delhi.
In a candid interview, he discussed at length Muslim participation in the protests in Delhi. He said Prakash Raj, Yogendra Yadav, and a number of other prominent figures are sitting in the IMCR office in Nizamuddin, strategizing the protest. IMCR is a non-political, non-religious, non-governmental organization (NGO) based in New Delhi.
Asked why Muslims appear absent from the protest, Mohammad Adeeb, a former president of the AMU Students’ Union, said, “This is to prevent the opposition from turning the agitation into a communal issue. I am sure the agitation would have become an India-Pakistan cricket match if names like Umar Khalid or Sharjeel Imam had begun circulating in the media.”
“To avoid religious polarization, we have deliberately not allowed Muslim names to dominate the public space,” Mr. Adeeb said. He added that a sizable number of Muslim boys and girls are being arrested on the streets of Delhi while protesting with the slogan “vote chor, gaddi chor.”
He further said, “On October 28, 2026, the IMCR has called prominent members of the Muslim community in India to Delhi to deliberate on the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) process initiated by the Election Commission. Community members will reflect on the SIR at the day-long event and adopt a resolution demanding that the government scrap it completely. Other resolutions may also be passed that day,” he said.
Mr. Adeeb expressed optimism about the CJP agitation. He said the protests have changed the entire Hindu-Muslim narrative in the country. Explaining further, Mr. Adeeb said, “Since 2014, a toxic right-wing ideology of hatred toward Muslims has permeated the country. The entire political space has been hijacked, so that talking about the government’s accountability is treated as a crime against the nation.
“In the last 12 years, the BJP has shrunk public space for Muslims so much that they have been reduced to mere onlookers in their own motherland. The CJP agitation has succeeded in turning the BJP’s narrative on its head, demanding accountability from the government, and sweeping away the communal elements that had become part of public discourse.
“This agitation rises above communities. The protesters and their leaders are part of civil society and have taken up the challenge of cleaning up the muck spread by the BJP. Every protester should be saluted for such bravery.
“The agitators are taking on the BJP government for its act of vote robbery and the disenfranchisement of some 15 crore voters. This is a crime against the country, and the nation should ensure that it is punished,” he said.
When Mr. Adeeb’s attention was drawn to remarks by some clerics that Muslims should not take part in the CJP-led agitation because they will be miserably punished, the Muslim social activist said that such people are cowards of the community and may have been paid to offer such lip service. Muslims should not fear anyone, he said, as this is a do-or-die battle.
Commenting on AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi’s absence from the ongoing CJP-led opposition demonstrations in Delhi, Mr. Adeeb said Owaisi is a B-team member of the BJP. He expressed surprise that even after Owaisi’s vitriolic comments, the government never touches him, suggesting some understanding between the government and the so-called Muslim leader.
M. H. Jawahirullah, an MLA in the Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly and a prominent Muslim leader in the state, echoed Mr. Adeeb’s sentiments. He said Indian Muslims are the worst sufferers of the SIR process. A large majority of Muslim voters have been deleted from India’s electoral rolls. The BJP has wreaked havoc on the Muslim community. SIR is not only an anti-Muslim provision but an anti-national act.
Jawahirullah rebuked those who called on Muslims not to participate in the Cockroach Janata Party agitation in Delhi, saying they are not “the sole spokesmen” of Muslims in India. He called the CJP agitation a positive development that has opened the eyes of many Indians to the BJP’s misrule in the country.
Jawahirullah further said protests against the SIR are going on every day in Tamil Nadu. He acknowledged that, since it is a national issue, the focus of the protests is in Delhi rather than in regional centers.
Jawahirullah concluded that the CJP protest has one message for the entire country: if voting is going to take place through ballot boxes in India, the BJP cannot stop the political change that is around the corner.
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*Journalist based in Chennai
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