The History Behind Cockroach Janta Party

By Sudais Siddique

Most internet movements start as a joke, and most disappear within a week. CJP is the exception that kept going. Here is the story in four stages.

Stage 1: The throwaway joke

It began as a punchline shared in group chats, a way of saying that ordinary people feel like pests in the political conversation.

Stage 2: The mascot

A character gave the joke a face. The cockroach with glasses and a laptop became shorthand for a hard-working, extremely online survivor.

Stage 3: The explainers

Readers started asking what it was all about, so the project began answering with plain-language explainers and longer reads.

Stage 4: The editorial desk

Today CJP is a small digital magazine covering satire, youth issues and internet culture. It is still independent, still unbothered, and still not a registered party.

Read next: The meaning behind the cockroach symbol.