Indian police detain several people in Gen Z-led protests against voter roll changes

Indian police detained several people in New Delhi on Saturday, disrupting a second day of protests backed by the Gen Z-led Cockroach Janta Party and other opposition groups against changes to voter rolls. The protesters say the changes benefit Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s governing party and are demanding the resignation of India’s election chief. The demonstrations mark the latest in a series of youth-led protests that have emerged this year, putting pressure on Modi unprecedented in his 12 years in power. About 100 demonstrators removed security barricades on Saturday and chanted “vote thief, leave the post” and “Gyanesh Kumar, step down” before police forcibly detained some of them.

Independent lawmaker Kapil Sibal, left-wing All India Students’ Association President Neha Bora and political activists Prashant Bhushan and Yogendra Yadav were among the protesters, according to a Reuters witness. The police declined to comment on the number and identity of those detained. “First they removed people from the voters list and now they are not letting us raise our voice against this. This is not acceptable,” Bora told Reuters . Neha Bora, National President of the All India Students’ Association (AISA), is detained by police during a protest demanding the resignation of India’s Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar, in New Delhi, India on October 3, 2026. — Reuters The chief of the Election Commission, Kumar, has not commented on the protests and the demands to step down. On Friday, police stopped a group of protesters from gathering, bundling them into…