We hereby share a statement by the Revolutionary Students’ Front (RSF), published on October 17.

Statement from the Revolutionary Students’ Front (RSF) Against the Undemocratic State Repression by the Brahminical Hindutva Fascist Government upon the ongoing Anti-SIR Movement

Yesterday (16/10/2026), the Cockroach Janata Party (CJP) called for a programme titled ‘Lehra Do Tiranga’ at Connaught Place in Delhi. As on every previous occasion, the Delhi Police once again detained the leadership of CJP and every other opposition organisation, one by one, before the programme could even begin. Those agitating for the resignation of CEC Gyanesh Kumar were not merely detained; rather, each of them, including Neha Bora and Abhijeet Dipke, was abducted and taken away. Comrades from the Bhagat Singh Chhatra Ekta Manch were detained from the protest site too. The protesters’ phones were confiscated, and they were forcibly removed in buses while being beaten. All communication was cut off, and the whereabouts of the protesters were concealed. According to the latest update received this morning, although Neha Bora and several others have been released, CJP founder Abhijeet Dipke is to be produced before the Special Executive Magistrate’s Court today.

This is not an isolated incident. A look at the sequence of events over the past several months makes it clear that the police and military, acting as hired goons of the fascist government, are unleashing and will continue to unleash full-scale repression against the movement. During the movement demanding the resignation of the then Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan, the police were seen removing their nameplates, deploying explosive tear gas, delivering electric shocks and nail-studded batons aimed at protesters’ heads. We have also witnessed the anti-people activities of Hindutva goons disguised as police personnel. This time, they are determined to deprive people of the very right to assemble and protest. By abducting the leadership of these mass movements and keeping them in secret detention, they seek to intimidate the protesters. The ruling classes have employed these methods before, against Kashmiris fighting for their right to self determination, against Adivasi people fighting for their right to jal-jangal-zameen, as well as against revolutionary communist political activists. Today, the same methods of repression are being deployed against broader mass movements.

We, the Revolutionary Students’ Front (RSF) want to make it clear that people are not afraid of this repression. Opposition to the government is not a crime. Secretly detaining anyone for this reason is not only undemocratic but also a violation of civil rights. In this situation, alongside the mass movements, there is a need to form people’s own self-defence committees to resist police brutality. The whereabouts of every comrade must be disclosed to the public immediately, and they must be released unconditionally. This kind of secret detention is completely undemocratic and illegal, this must not be allowed to continue. The Fascist project of SIR was implemented in the interests of imperialist powers and their domestic agents, to create a vast source of cheap, disposable labour by stripping people of their citizenship and democratic rights. So, the collective struggle against depriving the working class people, Dalits, Adivasis, Muslims, women and other marginalised communities of their rights must continue. Demanding for the scrapping of SIR, along with the resignation and arrest of Gyanesh Kumar, the architect of the BJP-RSS’s fascist SIR agenda, and a fair investigation against him, is now the duty of every democratic, progressive and anti-fascist organisation and every sensible individual. To achieve this, we must take up the responsibility of building a broader, militant mass movement, uniting with the people affected by SIR.