The 2026 Jantar Mantar protests: a day-by-day timeline

Nothing about the first three weeks looked like the beginning of a mass movement. The exam failed, a judge made a remark, and a parody account was registered.

June is where the protest acquires a shape — permission-limited gatherings at a single site, a national campaign running alongside them, and a hunger strike announced as a deadline.

Through the first half of July the protest's centre of gravity shifted from the CJP's digital campaign to Wangchuk's fast. That shift is what converted it from a youth movement the government could wait out into a situation with a clock on it.

Opposition parties came to the site. Former Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal joined on 16 July and suggested Wangchuk should be education minister.

By 17 July, the nineteenth day, Wangchuk had lost 9.1 kilograms. Doctors reported he had begun losing muscle mass, and video circulated of him unable to stand unaided.

The CJP's X account, restricted on 21 June, was restored by order of the Delhi High Court on 7 July.

On 16 July the NEET retest results were declared, confirming that more than 270,000 candidates who sat in May had not sat the retest — a figure that fed directly into the compensation demand.

18 July — Delhi Police removed Wangchuk from Jantar Mantar and admitted him to Safdarjung Hospital, citing medical advice. Organisers said it was a forced removal without notice. Leader of the Opposition Rahul Gandhi criticised the action. Dipke and others began their own indefinite hunger strike in protest at the removal.

The monsoon session of Parliament opened on 20 July, and the CJP called a march on Parliament House. Tens of thousands gathered at Jantar Mantar; Al Jazeera reported more than ten thousand attempting the march.

CJP representatives Ashutosh Ranka and Saurav Das met Union Health Minister J. P. Nadda and presented demands: Wangchuk's release, Pradhan's resignation, and ₹1 crore compensation for the families of NEET aspirants who died by suicide.

At the barricades, police used baton charges and tear gas as protesters attempted to break through. What happened next is contested on the record.

Delhi Police stated 118 police personnel were injured and 15 to 20 government vehicles damaged, and initially said no protesters were detained.

Hospital authorities recorded around 60 injured protesters; Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital logged 65 medico-legal cases by 7 p.m. The CJP reported roughly 150 hospitalised, one member with a broken leg, and around 70 detained — a detention figure police later confirmed, saying legal action would follow.

Delhi Police denied using pellet guns. A general diary entry at Parliament Street police station recorded two Rapid Action Force pellet rounds fired that day, and Safdarjung Hospital records described pellet wounds. One protester alleged a live round; the medical report described gunshot trauma to the right ear, while police attributed it to a blunt weapon.

Video of Additional Deputy Commissioner of Police Sandeep Lamba slapping a woman protester circulated widely and became a separate political controversy; former Rajya Sabha MP Saket Gokhale lodged a complaint.

Gurdwara Bangla Sahib, a few hundred metres away, opened as refuge for students fleeing batons and tear gas. Five metro stations were closed — Seva Teerth, Central Secretariat, Patel Chowk, Janpath and Rajiv Chowk. Police cleared the stage and tents; protesters rebuilt the camp overnight in rain.

Three AISA activists ended their hunger strikes. Wangchuk continued his from Safdarjung Hospital.

The four days after the baton charge ran on two tracks at once: the protest widened across the country while ministers negotiated privately with a man on the twenty-fourth day of a hunger strike.

Dharmendra Pradhan resigned as Union Education Minister on 25 July 2026. In a letter addressed to 'young friends' he said he had sent his resignation to the Prime Minister considering 'the situation that has developed at Jantar Mantar and across the country', taking moral responsibility for developments in the medical entrance examination while defending the government's handling of the crisis. He was succeeded by Prahlad Joshi.

The same day, a Special Commissioner of Police and two other officers were injured in stone-pelting, and police again used baton charges and tear gas. Eighteen metro stations stayed closed for a fourth day.

The CJP called off the protest at a joint press conference with Nadda and Singh Rana. The government's stated commitments were: police cases against protesters withdrawn in NDA-ruled states, no future action against protesters, and maximum compensation to the families of students who died by suicide as per rules.

26 July — The Students Federation of India's UK chapter held a demonstration at Trafalgar Square in London to mark the resignation, attended by Greta Thunberg, who said the Indian student protest showed 'what we can achieve when people come together and resist'.

27 July — The Prime Minister constituted a high-powered task force under Nandan Nilekani to reform NTA examinations, with S. Somanath, Tapan Deka, V. Kamakoti, Anita Karwal and Amrit Lal Meena as members. Within days the CJP and AISA alleged the anti-punishment assurance was not being honoured and said more than a hundred students had been arrested after the protest, raising the possibility of restarting.

The unresolved edge of the settlement is jurisdictional. The case-withdrawal assurance covered NDA-ruled states. FIRs were registered against around 400 people in Mumbai and about 100 booked in Kochi. Delhi Police separately alleged that 2,873 men with criminal records were present at the protest sites between 20 and 25 July, an allegation the organisers reject and which no court has tested.