New Delhi: A day after the protest organised by the Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) was met with a police crackdown, scores of personnel in civilian clothes alongside uniformed personnel came under scrutiny. Several of them, with sticks in their hands, have been captured launching a lathi charge on protesters, drawing sharp criticism.
“Who are you and why are you not wearing a uniform and a name badge?” one of the protesters facing the crackdown confronted one such personnel. At this, the man renewed the assault, visible in a video which has now gone viral on social media. Similarly, in another video, which appeared to have been shot at Connaught Place, a policeman in plain clothes can be seen unleashing lathis on protesters.
ये लोग पुलिस वाले तो नहीं लग रहे हैं 😳
कौन है ये लोग??
क्या छात्रों को पीटने के लिए गुंडे बुलाए गए थे?? pic.twitter.com/QpzjoZXGp4
— Cockroach Janta Party (@CJP_for_India) July 20, 2026
Responding to the allegations, senior Delhi Police officers acknowledged that the men were indeed policemen, deployed in plainclothes.
“They are from the special staff and from the teams which are not part of active policing duties. This is not illegal deployment. However, they are deployed in law and order duties as reinforcements during situations such as yesterday’s, and it was neither illegal nor unprecedented,” a senior police officer told ThePrint.
Trinamool Congress MP Mahua Moitra asked the Delhi Police through X to come clean on the records of such individuals. She identified one such personnel as Honey Dagar.
“So @DelhiPolice, can you come clean on Honey Dagar? Who is he? Where does he live? How was he beating up our kids alongside uniformed cops yesterday? Let’s track this man down, I say,” the Krishnanagar MP wrote on her X timeline.
According to a publicly available transfer order of the Delhi Police, Dagar was a police constable posted with the 8th batallion of armed police. However, his current posting details could not be verified.
According to his social media account, Dagar, originally a resident of Bahadurgarh, joined the police force in 2020. In some of the social media posts, he has also used phrases such as “jai jat devta” and suggested that he also worked for the Commando unit of the police force in Delhi.
Meanwhile, some videos also surfaced purportedly showing men without uniform involved in improper handling of female protesters, attracting sharp criticism from Congress spokesperson Supriya Shrinate.
“What the bloody hell??? How dare your police target women’s private parts Amit Shah? Sick,” Shrinate said on X.
What the bloody hell???
How dare your police targets women’s private parts Amit Shah?
Sick pic.twitter.com/rtjdgWwspp
— Supriya Shrinate (@SupriyaShrinate) July 21, 2026
The Delhi Police did not respond to these allegations.
(Edited by Viny Mishra)