From 'Treason' to Gen Z Anthem: The Journey of 'Azadi' in India's Student Protests

New Delhi, India — In the early hours of July 26, authorities dispatched workers to paint over graffiti-covered walls near the Jantar Mantar observatory in New Delhi. A day earlier, protests led by the Cockroach People's Party (CJP) had forced India's Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan to resign following a question paper leak scandal.

At the entrance to the protest site, large lettering read: “#2026 GEN-Z REVOLUTION!!!”. A young man in his twenties climbed a tree, hoisting a high-powered loudspeaker, and blasted the song: “Azadi, give me freedom! Azadi, give me freedom!”. The crowd echoed the lyrics, raising their arms in rhythmic unison.

Azadi, meaning “freedom,” was popularized as a hip-hop track in the Bollywood film Gully Boy (2019) and has become the unofficial anthem of the student protest movement – one of the biggest challenges to Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government in years. A video of police using batons on students along Parliament Street in New Delhi revived the nearly decade-old song. Beyond Delhi, chants of “Azadi” have echoed in Jaipur, Lucknow, and Mumbai.

Just a decade ago, “Azadi” was among the most “dangerous” words – a protest slogan criminalized in Delhi, leading to treason charges against several student leaders. The journey of this chant – from Pakistan's feminist movement and Kashmir's resistance to the Indian mainstream – reflects the evolution of both a political slogan and student activism under Modi over the past ten years.

'Criminalizing university spaces'

On December 9, 2016, an evening that seemed ordinary at Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), one of India's premier public universities and a hotbed of political activism for decades, turned into a national flashpoint. A group of students organized a discussion on the death penalty in India, examining the case of a Kashmiri man hanged for a 2001 armed attack on parliament. The event exploded into national politics when pro-government TV channels repeatedly aired footage of students chanting “Azadi,” led by then-JNU Students' Union President Kanhaiya Kumar.

Pro-government media labeled the students “terrorist sympathizers” and even aired doctored clips. Within days, treason charges and arrest warrants were issued. Umar Khalid and others were granted bail a few weeks later. Banojyotsna Lahiri, a close friend of Khalid and one of the event's organizers, recalled: “The media trial was intense. It was a deliberate campaign to portray these students as traitors living on taxpayers' money.”

JNU had long been a bastion of left-liberal politics, making it a target for the Hindu-right majoritarian forces, especially under Modi. But JNU wasn't the only university with an anti-establishment movement at the time. After the death of Dalit student Rohith Vemula in Hyderabad due to discrimination, protests erupted and were suppressed by the government.

The events of early 2016 kicked off a government campaign to gradually shrink dissent space in public universities. Right-wing goons attacked student leaders; Khalid was shot in New Delhi; universities were barred from holding discussions, screenings, or protests. Apoorvanand, a professor at Delhi University, observed: “For the first time in independent India's history, the government launched a coordinated, systematic attack on the student movement.”

The journey of 'Azadi'

In 2019, protests erupted against a proposed citizenship law deemed discriminatory against Muslims. Several Muslim student leaders in Delhi rose to prominence through passionate speeches but were later arrested on charges including terrorism. Umar Khalid was re-arrested, and Sharjeel Imam remains detained without trial for six years.

After the 2016 controversy, images of JNU echoing with “Azadi” inspired music producer Dub Sharma to create an electronic track based on the crowd's chants. Three years later, director Zoya Akhtar used the song in Gully Boy, featuring rapper Divine. However, the film version retained only the “freedom from poverty” refrain, omitting other calls for social justice, sparking controversy. Sharma's new remix this year has become the anthem of the student protest movement demanding education reform.

The political life of “Azadi” can be traced to Pakistan's feminist movement against General Zia-ul-Haq's military dictatorship in the 1980s. The late feminist activist Kamla Bhasin once recalled being drawn to the slogan's versatility and adapting it to the Indian context. In a 2020 interview, she called it “a living, breathing slogan. It grows every day, evolves every day. Its meaning isn't fixed.”

The Cockroach movement and Gen Z's rise

A month after India's Chief Justice controversially compared unemployed youth to “cockroaches and parasites,” the word “cockroach” quickly became a focal point in June 2026. Abhijeet Dipke, a Boston University graduate, had an idea: “What if all the cockroaches stood up together?” He immediately launched a social media campaign called the Cockroach People's Party (CJP), amassing over 22 million Instagram followers – double that of Modi's BJP.

Dipke returned to India, announcing a movement for education reform, starting with the Education Minister's resignation following a series of exam scandals affecting millions of students. On June 6, he arrived in New Delhi and went straight to the Jantar Mantar protest site, standing alongside Neha Bora, 29, the national president of the All India Students' Association (AISA).

Bora said student organizations like hers “helped keep the movement on its feet.” Volunteers took shifts at the protest site for a month, providing slogans, banners, and a voice that helped the movement reach international audiences. “Sitting in protest requires a lot of repetition with the people you want to bring in. As a student organization, we know how to keep a movement alive: bringing different sections of society to support – lawyers, professors, and farmers.”

Political analysts note that the Jantar Mantar movement is notable for how seasoned organizers – those whose political views were criminalized for years – quietly equipped the younger generation to organize a movement that appears leaderless on the surface.

Rediscovering 'Azadi'

This summer, India's political grammar seemed to invert in the Gen Z protest wave. What's changed in New Delhi since 2016?

Lahiri, Khalid's friend, points to one crucial difference: “The citizenship protests earlier were by Muslims, led by Muslims. Their names were Muslim, making them easier to criminalize.” In contrast, none of the most prominent names in this year's student protests are Muslim, even though organizers have repeatedly condemned the government's “politics of hate and division.” Mohammad Junaid, the lone Muslim volunteer at the protest site, and his family faced police harassment after the movement ended.

The biggest difference lies in media approach. N Sai Balaji, AISA's president from 2019 to 2023, believes the new generation of students is “tech-savvy, knows how to convey messages, and is fluent in internet language because they grew up with it.” They “become the media themselves” instead of relying on traditional channels that lean pro-government. “No one calls them traitors in this new space,” Balaji emphasized.

As university spaces were criminalized, student politics spilled onto the streets, Lahiri observed, and the new generation is “doing politics under harsher circumstances.” Among the countless memes and posters flooding social media, one line stuck with Lahiri: “Umar Khalid walked so Gen Z could run.” She's not sure Khalid would agree, but she does.

Bora asserted: “When students face police violence – when baton wounds are still fresh on their bodies – one understands that the Azadi slogan is the most powerful affirmation of fundamental rights in India.”