Abhijeet Dipke, founder of “Cockroach Janata Party (CJP)”, on Saturday shared a screen recording, claiming that over 94 per cent of the satirical outfit's audience on Instagram was from India before the its account was “hacked”. His post came as a counter to union minister Kiren Rijiju's post in which he had shown “pity” for those seeking followers from Pakistan. While the minister had not named anyone directly in his post, it was seen by many as a comment on the ongoing controversy over the alleged blocking of CJP accounts across platforms.
The ‘Cockroach Janata Party’, which has been in focus for many days now, was floated as a satire online after remarks by Chief Justice of India Surya Kant calling some of the country's youth “cockroaches” sparked a row.
The party, started as a joke, soon garnered immense support online as people proudly associated themselves with the term “cockroaches”. In the days that followed, the CJP took the social media by storm, with its Instagram followers surpassing those of the BJP by a significant margin.
However, its founder Abhijeet Dipke recently claimed that the party's X account was withheld in India, and made similar claims for its Instagram account and website.
What Dipke said on CJP's audience
Taking to X, Abhijeet Dipke shared some statistics of the party's Instagram account in a screen recording. The data he shared showed that the account had 1.6 billion views and 12 million new followers from April 22 to May 21.
{{/usCountry}}Taking to X, Abhijeet Dipke shared some statistics of the party's Instagram account in a screen recording. The data he shared showed that the account had 1.6 billion views and 12 million new followers from April 22 to May 21.
{{/usCountry}}It also showed a demographic on the party's audience on the platform, with 94.1 per cent followers from India, 1 per cent from the US, 0.7 per cent from the UK and 06 per cent each from Canada and the UAE.
“More than 94% of the audience is from India. Why is a Union Minister @KirenRijiju labelling Indian youth as Pakistani?," Dipke wrote. He said the data in the screen recording was from before the Instagram account was “hacked”.
Kiren Rijiju's ‘Pak and George Soros’ dig
Abhijeet Dipke shared the statistics shortly after union minister Kiren Rijiju, without naming the CJP or any other outfit, expressed “pity” on those seeking social media followers from Pakistan and “George Soros gang”. In another post, Rijiju said: “India has enough population and highly energetic youth population who could be genuine and valuable followers! No need to seek validation from the anti India gang.”
Earlier, union minister Sukanta Majumdar also pushed back against the CJP, saying half of the satirical party's followers were from Pakistan. “The big thing is that 49 per cent of followers of the 'Cockroach Janta Party' on social media are from Pakistan, while only 9 per cent are from India,” he said on Saturday, as per a PTI report.
Also Read: ‘I too am a cockroach’: Oppn leaders endorse party, say it's ‘BJP vs CJP’. A look at names
The CJP has been a hit among the Indian Opposition, with members like Trinamool's Mahua Moitra and Kirti Azad rallying behind it, and former Kerala chief minister Pinarayi Vijayan condemning the party's X account being withheld in India.
However, several BJP leaders have accused the outfit of creating chaos and trying to destablise the country through a cross-border "influence operation".