A prominent Indian activist who has been on a hunger strike for more than 20 days in New Delhi, demanding education reforms and justice for millions of students, was removed by the police on Saturday and taken to a hospital, the authorities said.
The activist, Sonam Wangchuk, started his strike last month as part of a wider protest that began after India canceled its nationwide medical college entrance exams because test questions had been leaked. Such leaks have become a chronic problem, year after year affecting millions of students seeking placement in medical colleges or competing for coveted government jobs.
The leaks have amplified outrage among many young Indians over educational mismanagement and unemployment.
A video posted on Saturday by the Cockroach Janta Party, a movement that started the protest and takes its name from a judge’s disparaging comment comparing India’s unemployed youth to cockroaches, showed police officers in civilian clothes forcing their way through a group of Mr. Wangchuk’s supporters to pick him up and carry him to an ambulance.
“They dragged Sonam sir away while hurling abuse at him,” said Abhijeet Dipke, the founder of the Cockroach Janta Party. Mr. Dipke said that when he had tried to enter the protest area, he was assaulted by police officers.
The Delhi police said in a statement on Saturday that a “slight commotion ensued” when “protesters tried to create obstruction,” but that officers had moved Mr. Wangchuk “to the hospital for essential medical care” in keeping with court orders. They appeared to be referring to a high court directive that had asked the authorities to monitor Mr. Wangchuk’s health and “intervene” if they determined that medication was necessary.
The police statement added, “We request the protesters at Jantar Mantar to peacefully vacate the place at the earliest,” referring to the site in the capital where the protests have been officially confined.
As Mr. Wangchuk’s health deteriorated over the course of his hunger strike — without the government responding to his demands — the protest movement quickly grew in number. Mr. Wangchuk had been calling specifically for the resignation of India’s education minister, Dharmendra Pradhan, under whose watch the recent medical school exam was leaked.
The Indian government has not formally responded to the protest demands. Last month, Mr. Pradhan dismissed the movement in a television interview and called the C.J.P. the “B-team of disruptive elements.”
The movement’s stubbornness has become a challenge for the government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India, which in the past has resisted public calls for accountability over issues like repeated deadly rail disasters.
The protesters have tapped into palpable anger across the country, and they say the hunger strike, which several young activists have joined Mr. Wangchuk in, is the only way to raise their voice at a time of shrinking space for peaceful dissent. Families often sell land or borrow money to put their children through coaching centers preparing for these exams as their best ticket out of poverty, only to find that the test was leaked and the answers sold, giving the rich a leg up.
At the protest site in the days leading up to Mr. Wangchuk’s arrest, concerns were growing that the government might seize and force-feed Mr. Wangchuk rather than concede to the movement’s demands, which would undercut Mr. Modi’s strongman image. The only time that Mr. Modi has directly given in to public protest was when farmers blocked the entrances to New Delhi in 2020 and sat in protest for a year, demanding the repeal of new laws that removed state protections for the agriculture industry.
Police presence around Jantar Mantar was ramped up on Saturday and roads leading to the site were blocked, protesters said.
“This is not out of a concern for Sonam Wangchuk’s health,” said Anish Gawande, an opposition politician who has frequently visited the protest camp. “This is to shut down a democratic protest. Instead of protecting students, the government is protecting the education minister.”
Mr. Wangchuk, who said on Friday that he had lost 20 percent of his body mass — “after fats, it will be the organs, and then the brain,” he said — had promised to march on Parliament on Monday.
Before his arrest, Mr. Wangchuk said that people had been asking him if he thought the government would be moved to action by his protest. He told them that in India’s history, three governments had fallen to protests over onion prices.
“We are talking about the lives of our children here” he said, adding, “It will affect your house also. This protest can’t even bring an answer, a resignation?”
Government doctors tried to move Mr. Wangchuk to a hospital on Friday but he resisted.
“They don’t understand,” he said. “This is not a disease or disorder — this is a self chosen.”
Mr. Wangchuk’s wife, Gitanjali J Angmo, said on Saturday that she had reached the hospital where her husband had been taken and warned the authorities against interfering in his strike.
“Nothing should be administered to him orally or intravenous” without consent, she said in a post on social media.
