A pest entered the news cycle recently. One that most people would like to either squash or obliterate with a deadly spray. So far, it has not been either squashed or obliterated. Only time will tell whether it can really weather all the storms that will come its way.

The online phenomenon, the Cockroach Janta Party, that began as a joke on social media has now manifested itself with feet on the ground. And it intends to continue to rally its online supporters and get them out and away from their computers, tablets and phones.

We can only speculate whether the CJP will transform itself into a political party. Or whether it will remain a group with a one-point agenda – demanding accountability from the Modi government about the recent leak of the NEET examination papers that has affected lakhs of young people across the country.

However, the very fact of the emergence of something like the CJP holds out lessons for the media, especially mainstream media. While newspapers have taken note of the CJP and most covered its rally in Jantar Mantar, New Delhi on June 6, mainstream TV channels have largely ignored it.

Social media has been rife with speculation about the government’s approach towards the CJP.  When demonstrations against the NEET leak by the Congress party’s student wing were put down with a heavy hand by the police in different parts of the country, how come the government allowed the CJP to hold its demonstration? And with that question comes speculation about the fledgeling group’s links with the BJP.

If you search print media, it is hard to find a plausible explanation about the Modi government’s soft response to the CJP. The Indian Express carried a front-page story quoting various leaders of the BJP. One of them is quoted as saying: “It’s part of democracy. Such things happen in democracies.” Ironic, given the same government has prevented peaceful demonstrations on a range of issues claiming they endangered “national security”.

But apart from what these BJP leaders said, what is significant is that none of them came on record with their views, a reflection on how tightly controlled the governing party is in terms of a media narrative.

Also, irrespective of the politics, or the lack of it, around the CJP, the very fact of its existence holds out important lessons for mainstream media.

It illustrates how a country, where most of the population is under 35 years, now gets its news and information from platforms other than mainstream media. And that even frustration and anger are expressed on these platforms. The fact that so far this has not been converted into votes that can affect the outcome of elections is not as relevant as what this indicates about the focus, or the lack of focus, in mainstream media that is turning millions of people away from it.

I suggest that it is the absence of news and reports in mainstream media about what is happening in most parts of the country that is the trigger for the growing disillusionment. Speak to anyone from the working class – a taxi or autorickshaw driver, a construction worker, a domestic help – and ask them what they turn to for news. Nine times out of 10 they will mention a YouTube channel that brings them local news from the region where they have their homes. Mainstream channels are rarely accessed and print media even less frequently.

The very fact that the CJP was able to garner such a huge support in such a short time on Instagram indicates the popularity of this particular social media platform with young people.

This does not mean that the days of so-called “legacy” media are over. But it does call for introspection on the direction that mainstream media has taken, especially in the last decade, and raises questions about whether it can change and find ways to become more relevant.

There are always exceptions. It is encouraging to read reports in some of the established print media that draw attention to the situation away from the national capital and politics.

This report by Purnima Sah in Indian Express on a perennially neglected part of Maharashtra, part of its tribal belt, is particularly striking. Nandurbar district, from where she reports, has been covered in the past. I can personally recollect from the 1980s that there were stories of the lack of water, and health care in the region, of children dying of malnutrition, of women bearing the burden of collecting water and firewood.

In India of 2026, little has changed. Women still do the back-breaking work of collecting water. There is poor connectivity in terms of roads. Basic health care remains inaccessible. And the women pay a terrible price with “chronic pelvic pain, uterine prolapse, recurrent vaginal infections, miscarriages, kidney stones and debilitating back pain conditions they believe are linked to years of carrying heavy loads of water from childhood.”

Such stories are few. Instead, what we read, or hear, are reports about how brilliantly the Indian economy is doing, how India is respected the world over, and how the government is reaching out to the poorest. Reading this, you could not imagine that areas of neglect like Maharashtra’s tribal belt remain where they were almost four decades back.

Or take another story that was on the front page in many newspapers because it was so shocking. Eight workers were killed and at least six injured when molten steel spilled on them at a public sector steel plant in Vishakhapatnam. Accidents do happen even in the best run factories.  But the horror of this one reminds us that these days there is little writing or investigation into workers’ safety and their rights. If you read carefully, almost every day there are small reports about accidents in factories, on construction sites, or manual scavenging despite a law that has banned it. But they are so easy to miss. And no one joins the dots to give us the bigger picture.

There are dozens more examples of these absences. To cover what is “real” India requires commitment and investment. It cannot be done sitting in an office, on the phone. These stories can only be told when there are feet on the ground.  

The absence of stories like the ones mentioned above inadvertently, or deliberately, furthers the government’s narrative that all is well. Repeating what is fed to the media has become such a norm now that one fails to be surprised.

The latest is the build-up to what we were told was Prime Minister Narendra Modi exceeding Jawaharlal Nehru’s record of being in office. No one questioned how these numbers were calculated. We were told that on completing 4,399 days in office “uninterruptedly”, Modi would surpass Nehru’s 4,398 days in office.  

This was repeated in every newspaper. World leaders sent in their congratulations. Ministers in the Modi government, including the education minister whose resignation is being demanded by the CJP, did pujas to mark the occasion. And we are told that at the cabinet meeting on that day, ministers resorted to synchronised clapping to felicitate the prime minister.

What practically no one, barring Aakar Patel in his column in Deccan Chronicle and this article in The Wire, pointed out that the calculation conveniently left out the years when Nehru was Prime Minister after Independence, that is 1947 to 1952 when the first general elections were held. And that in reality his total days in office “uninterruptedly” were over 6,000.  

This might sound like nit-picking. But it is an example of the ease with which these narratives are repeated now. Over time they become “fact” because we as journalists fail to do basic due diligence of questioning and checking.

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