Wangchuk rejects Ladakh LG’s claims, reaffirms support to ‘Cockroach Janta Party’
New Delhi: Renowned Ladakh-based climate activist Sonam Wangchuk has asserted that he considers himself an “honorary cockroach,” as he rejected Ladakh Lieutenant Governor VK Saxena’s claim that he was “unsure” of the online movement’s origins.
According to Kashmir Media Service, the remark came in response to a post by LG VK Saxena on Tuesday, following a meeting with Wangchuk and his wife and HIAL co-founder Gitanjali J Angmo.
The LG, in a post on X, said he cautioned Wangchuk against “weaving a misleading and provocative narrative” and claimed that the activist had accepted that comparing Ladakh with Manipur was an “error of judgement.”
Saxena also claimed Wangchuk was unsure about the origins of the Cockroach Janata Party, or CJP, and would “study the motivations of its founders and revisit his stand, if necessary.”
Rejecting the assertions, Wangchuk said that the meeting had been cordial and did not resemble the tone reflected in the LG’s public remarks.
“The Ladakh LG invited us for some meeting over a cup of tea. We spent nearly an hour in a cordial and friendly atmosphere discussing his initiatives, our work and possibilities of collaboration,” Wangchuk said.
He said Saxena raised his recent comments comparing Ladakh with Manipur and his support for the Cockroach Janta Party, but the interaction, Wangchuk said, did not carry any warning or reprimand.
“One hour after we left, we were surprised, and not very pleasantly, to see that he had tweeted in a tone as if he had censured us or cautioned us,” he said.
Wangchuk said he believed the public messaging may have been intended to satisfy political expectations elsewhere.
“I thought this was maybe to please some boss somewhere in Delhi who had instructed him to call me up and say such things, but the meeting was none like this, only the tweet was,” he said.
The educationist said he deliberately refrained from reacting immediately to what he called “childish behaviour”, and chose to respond only on the third day after the remarks appeared in several newspapers.
He also rubbished the LG’s claim on the Manipur comparison and said he never described the analogy as an “error of judgment.” “I don’t think it is an error of my judgment. I still totally stand by it,” he said, adding, he only said that the example was “avoidable” in the current context.
