Thousands of residents in India’s capital New Delhi have filled public thoroughfares in a widespread demonstration that has come to be known as the ‘cockroach protests’, with demonstrators uniting around a single core demand: sweeping, long-overdue changes to the country’s education system. Viral video footage shared widely across social media platforms has captured the moment law enforcement officers responded to the unrest by discharging pellet guns into the crowd, a escalation of force that has amplified public anger and drawn sharp scrutiny from rights observers. The unusual ‘cockroach’ moniker for the protests has its roots in demonstrators’ framing of themselves as marginalized groups that have been ignored and dismissed by authorities for years, much like unwanted pests that are pushed aside rather than addressed. While the immediate trigger for the mass mobilization varies across different segments of protesters, the overarching grievance centers on systemic flaws in India’s education sector, including underfunding, inequitable access to quality learning, outdated curriculum structures, and persistent job gaps for graduating students. As footage of the pellet gun use continues to circulate online, the demonstration has grown in size, with solidarity protests popping up in other major Indian cities, and calls growing louder for central and state education officials to open formal negotiations with protest leaders to address the community’s demands.