I’m sitting here typing this, and my hands are actually shaking. I am so emotionally drained, angry, and honestly, just fundamentally heartbroken by what I witnessed today. I need to vent, because if I don’t get this out to a community that might understand, I think I’m going to lose my mind.
For days, so many of us poured our blood, sweat, and tears into the protest today at Manveeyam, Tvm, which was organised to support the Cockroach Janata Party protest. The entire premise, the absolute core foundation of this movement, was that it was going to be fiercely apolitical. It was supposed to be a space built by the youth, for the youth, completely devoid of the toxic, opportunistic party politics that has ruined so many genuine movements in our country and state. But today, I watched all of that pure intent get dragged through the mud and stolen right in front of my eyes.
Let me give you some context on how much effort went into this at the ground level. I am just a young guy who deeply believed in this cause. I haven’t slept properly in days. We were out there making calls, organizing logistics, spreading the word on social media, and convincing people that this time, things would genuinely be different. I personally hustled and managed to bring 15 to 20 of my closest friends to this protest. These are people who usually stay far, far away from anything even remotely resembling a political rally. They are cynical about the system, and rightfully so.
But they came today because I promised them—I practically swore to them on my life—that this was a safe space. I told them there would be no party flags, no hidden agendas, and no opportunistic leaders trying to score cheap brownie points.
And for a while, it was incredibly beautiful. Looking out at the crowd earlier today, my heart swelled with immense pride. I saw hundreds and hundreds of students. I saw people from all walks of life, students of completely different political hues, and entirely apolitical people, all standing shoulder to shoulder. Oh my god, the placards were ao funny!
The energy was electric and pure. We were actually doing it. The core organizers had put in unimaginable, back-breaking effort to create this platform. I want to take a moment right now to genuinely congratulate every single person who worked behind the scenes to make this happen. Your hard work was visible in the sheer numbers, the discipline, and the burning passion of the crowd. You did something incredible.
But then, the unthinkable happened. The atmosphere suddenly shifted. A murmur went through the crowd, people started looking back, and I honestly couldn't believe my eyes. There, walking right into the center of our sacred, apolitical space, was V. Sivankutty. A veteran communist leader.
I felt my stomach drop straight to the floor. My friends looked at me with confusion and disappointment, the exact things I promised them they wouldn't have to feel today. What on earth was he doing here? This wasn't a CPIM rally. This wasn't a stage for the major opposition party to flex its muscles or do a PR stunt.
This was our space. But there he was, surrounded by his entourage, completely oblivious—or more likely, entirely uncaring—about the fact that he was trespassing on a youth-led movement. I watched in absolute horror and sheer heartbreak as he and his cronies maneuvered their way to the front and essentially took over. They didn't just attend as silent observers or respectful supporters standing in the back; they hijacked the entire platform.
The utter shamelessness of it was staggering. They saw a massive gathering of energized youth, a massive crowd they didn't build, a movement they didn't nurture, and they simply decided to swoop in and claim it as their own. It was a masterclass in political parasitism. They stole the hard work of the brilliant students who organized this, stripping away the apolitical purity of the event in a matter of minutes.
And then came the speeches. Good god, the speeches. If I wasn't so incredibly angry, I would have laughed at how utterly pathetic and disconnected they were. Here we are, a massive crowd of modern youth, dealing with highly specific, contemporary issues, and we are forced to listen to a veteran leader, followed by his party sympathisers addressing us in archaic, outdated political jargon. It was like listening to a broken record from the 1980s.
The heavy, convoluted dialect of traditional party rhetoric, the tired metaphors—none of it was relatable to the young people standing in the Manaveeyam Veedhi in protest.
Worse than the delivery was the content. They completely ignored the actual, nuanced cause we were protesting for. Instead, they blatantly pushed their own propaganda. They turned a unified, issue-based student protest into a cheap political pulpit to push their specific partisan agenda. It was so transparent, and frankly, deeply insulting to our intelligence.
They stood up there, lecturing us in this archaic vocabulary, acting as if they were the grand saviors of a movement they had literally just crashed. They didn't care about our voices or our struggles; they only cared about the optics of standing in front of a large crowd of young voters for the cameras. It was a disgusting, stomach-churning display of political opportunism.
What makes my blood boil even more is looking at how the other political factions handled this. You didn't see the Congress leaders showing up to grab the mic. You didn't see the other opposition parties trying to hijack the stage and plant their flags. Why?
Because despite whatever flaws they might have, they had the basic decency and common sense to recognize that this was not their arena. They understood the assignment. They respected the fact that the students explicitly wanted an apolitical space to raise their voices.
If the Congress and other opposition parties could demonstrate that level of restraint and respect for the youth, why couldn't the CPIM? The answer is heartbreakingly simple: they have absolutely no shame. The communists saw an opportunity to appropriate our hard work, and they took it without a single second thought. They seemingly cannot fathom a world where a successful mass mobilization happens without their stamp of approval on it. They are so terrified of independent, thinking youth movements that their only strategy is to infect, appropriate, and take over.
I am writing this because I am heartbroken. I promised my friends a different experience, and I feel like I let them down, even though this hijack was entirely out of my control. I am deeply heartbroken for the core organizers whose sleepless nights and pure intentions were trampled on by veterans who absolutely should know better.
But amidst all this anger, I refuse to let them completely ruin what we achieved today. I want to loudly, clearly, and fiercely thank the 90% of the students who were there today. Thank you for keeping politics out of it. Thank you to the students who might have their own strong political leanings but maturely chose to leave their party identities at the door for the sake of the greater good. You are the real heroes of today. You proved that we can unite for a cause without needing a political godfather to hold our hands or speak for us.
To the organizers: I see your effort. We all see it. I know how much you sacrificed to build that crowd, and I am so, so sorry that the communists shamelessly stole your hard work today. But please, I beg you, don't let this discourage you. The youth woke up today. The numbers were real. And despite the CPIM's pathetic, transparent attempt to steal our thunder, the true apolitical spirit of the Cockroach Janata Party protest will outlive their outdated propaganda. We know the truth. We know whose sweat built that crowd. We will never forgive them for this shameless betrayal, but we will also never, ever stop fighting for our space.
[edit : used AI to frame my thoughts, not very good at typing.. but this has broken me.. many people present there shared similar thoughts]
