In a green kurta, blue pants and a brown stole draped around her neck, Sujata Das (@theangrysiblingyt on Instagram) has a question for her followers. “Saath mein Delhi Police se maar khaane chaloge? (Want to join me for a beating from Delhi Police?),” reads the caption over the video. Another Insta account, @dayamaged, has also put up a tongue-in-cheek Insta post referring to the scale of police deployment in the capital amid the ongoing protests against Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Gyanesh Kumar. Kumar. The other posts feature clips of people running with cops after them, set to the popular mobile game Subway Surfers music.
Since June’s NEET protests, humorous social media content has become Gen Z’s way of drawing public attention to protests. What is also striking about these slogans and SM material is that anti-CEC protests, and other socio-political issues like patriarchy are being brought on the same table. Their slogans, too, don’t just live on protest-date; they return with multiplied force, humour and snark as the same protest gets called on different dates and sites. Recent protests and student marches at Delhi University following the alleged gang rape of a girl at a south Delhi park – its ripple effect has been seen in cities pan-India, from Mumbai to Assam’s Dibrugarh – have shown the same trend.
The assertion of women’s rights, freedom and dignity, and access to safe places are being paved with playful slogans such as “Ek Kachori, Do Samosa; Inn Mardon Ka Kya Bharosa? (One kachori, two samosas; there's no trusting these men)” , “Mere sir mein dard hai, iska kaaran mard hai” (I have a headache, and the reason for it is a man), “Rani beti rebel karegi” (The princess will rebel) and “My favourite season is the fall of patriarchy”.
Easy to recall, difficult to ignore
The catchy punchlines are bringing a new kind of protest vocabulary into public view, with young women plugging into the present restive moment to renew discussions on what has so far been seen only as ‘women’s issues’. They are making people laugh, share and scroll back for another look. However, the anger behind them is no laughing matter.
This new language of dissent is easy to remember and difficult to ignore. It has also raised an uncomfortable question: when anger comes wrapped in a joke, do people pay more attention to the issue, or simply laugh at the punchline?
Yuvraj Vohra, who has been associated with Hindu College's Women's Development Cell for the past two years, sees humour as a way of getting people past the door. “Without creative sloganeering, people may not have given this protest or rally the attention they have given it,” he explains. Smriti Phogat, president of the same cell, believes reels can be a useful tool for spreading awareness, particularly among young audiences.
A collective fight
Some of the slogans have drawn criticism for appearing to generalise men. According to Ilakkiya, a DU graduate and member of Bhagat Singh Chhatra Ekta Manch, women have faced pressure to remain silent about sexual assault for decades, often being told that speaking up would “bring shame to their families”. The growing willingness to protest reflects a refusal to accept that silence. The discussion, however, cannot end there, she says. “[The idea that not all men are patriarchal] cannot be used to deny that patriarchy exists. If you really have to take the conversation further, you’ll have to talk about it,” she adds.
Ilakkiya says students have been gathering for reading circles, poster making and discussing the roots of patriarchy. Men, too, have joined these protests and discussions, she notes, with some helping distribute pamphlets and support the demonstrations.
Vohra similarly argues that women's safety cannot be treated as a concern for women alone. “Women's issues are society's issues; they will only be solved through collective efforts of all genders,” he tells TMS. Perhaps, then, the significance of these slogans lies not in whether every provocative line is perfectly worded or that every joke lands as intended. It lies in their ability to make people continue to argue about issues that too often have been pushed aside just to arrive at an agreement.