Why did Dharmendra Pradhan resign as education minister?

Pradhan was Union Education Minister when NEET-UG 2026 was cancelled on 12 May 2026 after a question paper leak, and the demand for his resignation was the single consistent thread through the protests that followed.

The Cockroach Janta Party made it their core demand from their first street protest on 6 June, giving him seven days before threatening nationwide agitation, and launched a 'Pradhan Go Back' campaign on 30 June. Sonam Wangchuk's hunger strike, beginning 28 June, was explicitly for the same demand.

The pressure had four components by late July: Wangchuk's 26-day fast, which ended on 23 July with written government assurances; the 20 July march on Parliament and the police response to it, which produced widely circulated images including footage of a senior officer striking a woman protester; the adjournment of both Houses of Parliament for four consecutive days as the opposition demanded his resignation before any debate; and solidarity protests across a dozen Indian cities and abroad.

He resigned on 25 July 2026. His letter said he had sent the 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. Prahlad Joshi succeeded him as education minister.

It was the first time an Indian education minister had left office over an examination leak. He had remained in the post through the 2024 NEET-UG leak and the UGC-NET cancellation of the same year.

The CJP called off the protest the same day, at a joint press conference with ministers J. P. Nadda and Jitendra Singh Rana, after the government agreed to withdraw cases against protesters in NDA-ruled states, take no future action against them, and provide compensation to the families of students who died by suicide as per rules.