Arundhati Roy: ‘Does Modi know what was being said about him?’

“The question that I have in my mind,” said Arundhati Roy, strolling around Jantar Mantar on Monday, a day after Prime Minister Narendra Modi dropped his education minister to quell youth anger, “is that does Modi know what was being said about him or is he protected from it?”

What began as a protest over an examination paper leak in May had turned into a raging storm last week after Delhi Police used lathis and pellets against youth protestors. In response, young people unleashed a torrent of jokes and memes ridiculing the prime minister in language that Roy said was “delightfully profane”.

“I always think that humour is the distillation of politics,” said the writer, speaking to Scroll’s Executive Editor Supriya Sharma.

Roy said the ‘cockroach’ movement, which emerged out of a social media parody account, had already achieved more than what it had set out to do.

“To me, the greatest achievement of this movement is that a person who confected his image so carefully over literally 24 years, starting from 2002, a person who has never deigned to address a press conference, and is...

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