New Delhi: Ever since the Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) inspired Gen-Z to come out in thousands to protest against paper leaks in crucial national-level exams, the Jantar Mantar in Delhi has become a household topic of discussion across the country.
The weeks-long protest ultimately led to the resignation of Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan. And though Jantar Mantar 2.0, called by CJP over allegations of irregularities against Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Gyanesh Kumar in the conduct of SIR, wasn’t too impactful, a long-lasting impression seems to have been created.
A new video game inspired by the protests at Jantar Mantar has caught the internet’s attention.
Named ‘Jantar Mantar Chalo’, the video game offers a satirical take on the struggle to reach the venue (now denotified as a designated protest site by Delhi Police).
The 3D satirical video game, created by 27-year-old DevOps engineer and IT professional from Bareilly Suraj Kushwah, lets players experience the situation from either side of the barricades, giving them the option to join the protesters or play as Delhi Police.
“Build a kafila, dodge the police, reach Jantar Mantar and hold the dharna. Or be the police and stop them,” game description says.
Players have to enter a name, with the option of using a made-up username. They then have to decide which side they want to join. Those choosing ‘Andolankari’ are instructed to “Walk into people to grow your kafila. Reach Jantar Mantar.” And those opting for ‘Dilli Police’ are told to “Break kafilas with the lathi, lift leaders onto the bus. Watch out for big crowds!”
The video was shared on Instagram by the user named @bugswriter, who introduced the game as a fun experiment inspired by the events in Delhi.
The video was captioned, ‘Launching mantarjantar.com Parody game.’ The creator also said that the game could be accessed at mantarjantar.com without requiring a login.
“Recently Delhi mein jo bhi ho raha hai wo itna nonsense tha ki maine socha ki ek game bana dun iske upar aur aise hee time pass ke liye maine bana bhi diya. Aur main game developer itna kuch khaas hoon bhi nahi, maine AI ka help liya aur jo bhi tha saara daal diya (Whatever has been happening in Delhi lately was so ridiculous that I thought I’d make a game out of it. So, just for fun, I went ahead and made one. I’m not much of a game developer either, so I took the help of AI and put everything together”), the creator said.
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The digital twist to the Jantar Mantar protests has turned a politically-charged and electric event into an interactive parody, drawing praise from netizens.
Netizens were thrilled to come across the novel parody game, and praised the creator.
“We got Jantar Mantar protest simulator before GTA VI,” one user commented.
“This is really fun… Great job,” another wrote.
“Great stuff, Andolonkari is epic,” wrote someone.
