The Bar Council of India has alleged that the ongoing student protests over examination paper leaks have been hijacked by anti-social and anti-national forces. BCI Chairman Manan Kumar Mishra urged lawyers, intellectuals and citizens to counter what he described as a foreign-backed bid to destabilise India.
The Bar Council of India (BCI) issued a public appeal alleging that the ongoing student agitation over examination paper leaks has been commandeered by “anti-social and anti-national forces,” and calling upon lawyers, intellectuals and citizens to step in and counter what it describes as a foreign-backed attempt to destabilise the country.
The statement, titled “An Appeal to the Intellectuals of the Country,” has been issued by BCI Chairman and Senior Advocate Manan Kumar Mishra.
The BCI’s central claim is that students participating in the protests are innocent but are being misled and used, and that the agitation has been taken over by elements whose stated purpose is to damage the country.
The statement asserts that these forces are unable to reconcile themselves to India’s economic progress and growing international standing.
ALSO READ: Will Intervene If Supreme Court Metro Station Is Not Reopened by Afternoon: CJI Surya Kant
The statement says,
“Anti-social and anti-national forces have hijacked their agitation; the expressed objective of the anti-nationals is to undermine and ruin our country, as has occurred elsewhere in the recent past. These disruptive forces appear unable to reconcile themselves with India’s economic progress, expanding global stature and development,”
The press release claims that some politicians, accused of having foreign allegiances, are allegedly using deceptive tactics to encourage younger people to spread disorder.
The release adds,
“Every prudent person recognizes that such individuals have no genuine concern for the peace and prosperity of our Bharat; instead they are dancing at the tune of enemy countries,” re of students or the nation. Their sole motive is to create lawlessness, destabilize India, and seize power, and they have pursued this aim for a long time. They want our country also to be ruined like Bangladesh and Nepal,”
Mishra alleges that a small number of politicians with foreign loyalties are provoking younger people into lawlessness, and that such persons have no genuine interest in the welfare of students, being motivated instead by a desire to create disorder and capture power.
The statement invokes recent political upheavals in Bangladesh and Nepal as the outcome such actors are said to be working towards.
The statement claims that anti-social and anti-national elements have taken over a public agitation, asserting that their aim is to weaken and destroy the country similar to what the statement says has happened in other places in recent times. It further alleges that these disruptive forces cannot accept India’s economic advancement, its rising global standing, and ongoing development.
The press release also accuses a small number of politicians said to have foreign allegiances of manipulating and provoking younger people to encourage disorder. It argues that such individuals do not genuinely care about Bharat’s peace and prosperity, and instead are portrayed as acting in line with hostile countries’ interests.
It adds that these actors are said to be willing to go to any lengths to seize power or bring the country to ruin.
The release claims they are not concerned with students’ well-being or the nation’s welfare, but are primarily focused on creating chaos, destabilizing India, and gaining control an objective the statement says they have pursued for a long period. It also warns that the country could face the kind of turmoil allegedly seen elsewhere, naming Bangladesh and Nepal.
Several of the assertions in the appeal are considerably more particular, and correspondingly graver.
The statement alleges that an unnamed politician has travelled abroad frequently, met figures hostile to India including persons said to support terrorism, and received substantial funds over the past decade intended to destabilise the country. No name is given and no material is placed in support.
It further alleges that individuals described as experts in stone-pelting have been transported from Jammu and Kashmir and other States into Delhi and other cities in order to facilitate attacks on the police, and that such persons are being paid significant sums to assault personnel and damage public property.
The appeal also claims that large-scale social media campaigns have been orchestrated at the behest of Pakistan, China, Bangladesh and other countries, in collusion with certain Indian political parties, and operated from abroad to mislead young people through distorted information.
None of these allegations has been substantiated by any material placed in the public domain, and none has been tested or established before any court or investigative authority. No individual or organisation has been named in respect of the funding claim.
The appeal casts the legal profession in the role of a corrective force. Mishra contends that it falls to lawyers, intellectuals and prudent citizens to convey what he describes as the truth to students and to the wider public, invoking a tradition in which the professional classes have acted as spokespersons for the helpless and awakened public conscience when the country faced danger.
The statement also sets out expectations of others. Educational institutions, it says, ought to serve as spaces for informed dialogue and constitutional awareness rather than permitting impressionable students to be drawn into violence or into activity that could permanently damage their education and careers.
Parents and guardians are urged to remain alert to the influences acting on young people and to ensure they are not exploited by those seeking to turn their energy and idealism to unlawful ends.
Mishra closes by calling on lawyers, student leaders, political parties and the police to work together constructively, to dissuade young people from violence and to pursue lawful channels to restore calm, expressing the hope that unity and respect for the rule of law will prevail.
The significance of the BCI’s intervention lies in how sharply it diverges from the position taken by other institutions of the Bar over the same events.
The Supreme Court Bar Association has passed a resolution condemning the lathi charge on students and lawyers as excessive and disproportionate, and has sought an impartial, time-bound inquiry. The Supreme Court Advocates-on-Record Association has framed the matter in terms of Articles 19(1)(a) and 19(1)(b), taking the position that peaceful dissent is a constitutional freedom rather than defiance.
The Bombay Bar Association has voiced grave concern over the video material and deprecated the use of FIRs as an instrument of intimidation. Around 750 advocates across Delhi and Mumbai, among them several senior counsel and former judges, have signed statements condemning the police action, and a group of advocates recited the Preamble on the Supreme Court lawns on Thursday under the banner of a campaign to save democracy and the Constitution.
The apex statutory regulator of the profession has thus taken a position squarely at odds with the representative bodies of the Bar it regulates an unusual and, for the profession, consequential divergence.
Background
The agitation began in June 2026, led by the Cockroach Janta Party, a youth collective demanding accountability for the alleged leak of the 2026 NEET-UG question paper and the resignation of Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan.
It escalated on July 20, when an attempted march to Parliament was blocked by a heavy police deployment. Protesters and several bar bodies allege a lathi charge, tear gas and mass detentions; the Delhi Police have denied using excessive force, and police sources have separately claimed the protest was infiltrated by outside elements.
Both accounts are now before the Delhi High Court, which is hearing a batch of petitions alleging police excess and has separately agreed to hear a plea seeking an NIA investigation into the protests.