La beaute est dans la rue, “the beauty is in the street,” is an iconic phrase that was chanted during the May 1968 student movement in France. The movement began at a time when the French youth were considered as being bored, lazy and uninvolved in political activity. This apparent absence of political activity made journalist Pierre Viansson-Ponte publish an article in Le Monde on March 15, 1968, complaining that “what currently characterises our public life is boredom” and mocking French students who are “concerned with knowing if the girls of [the universities] in Nanterre and Antony can freely access boys’ rooms.” The concerns of French students seemed trivial to the French media. Yet to students, this was a protest against the restrictive rules applied against all, and more importantly, a desire to not be treated like children. They wanted to be recognised as adults who could lead adult lives. Similarly, students agitated in Nanterre against the Fouchet Reforms of French higher education. These reforms sought to increase efficiency, pushing for more competition to be introduced in universities and less leisure time for students. There was a clear demand for student voices to be heard and to be taken seriously in matters related to access to space and educational reforms. To the youth of our country, this might sound eerily similar to what they are experiencing today. This article seeks to chart a historical comparison between the May 1968 protests in France with the student movement currently being led by the Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) in India. The beauty is in the street because that is where one starts to experience unity and transformation. It is on the ground on which the movement and revolution take place. As part of the May 1968 movement, students had occupied university spaces such as Sorbonne, but also the streets surrounding these universities. This led to a change in the nature of the streets, one which allowed people who never would have interacted to finally talk with each other. A book titled May Made Me: An Oral History of the 1968 Uprising in France, authored by Mitchell Abidor, contains different anecdotal accounts from the participants of the movement. Alain Krivine, one of the movement’s leader, noted that “people talking to each other on the street, people you would pass every day and never say hello and then everyone was talking to everyone.” Joesph Potiron, another supporter of the movement, recalled how a capitalist dairy industrialist helped him in supplying milk to workers at a subsidised rate. Ordinarily, this would have never happened but the overall atmosphere that was created by the movement on the ground and on the streets, created a new kind of sympathy between strangers. Similarly, during the march to parliament organised by the CJP on July 20, 2026, the streets surrounding Jantar Mantar and Connaught Place were completely occupied and what one saw was exactly this connection being fostered between absolute strangers. People from all walks of life: school students, college students, NEET aspirants, parents, lawyers, delivery workers and so on, all came together to collectively raise their voices and to be heard. People shouted slogans together, discussed various issues and sang. The slogan “Jai Bhim” was perhaps the most commonly expressed. Others freely distributed packets of biscuits or chips, water bottles and fruit to whoever they came across, making sure no one was left hungry or thirsty in this journey that they set out on together. Different posters were raised and shared amongst the protesters. These, in particular, showcased the demands and perspectives of the youth. One poster reading “Democracy Needs Defenders,” advocated that it is ultimately up to us as citizens to agitate for democratic practices to be protected in our country. As many people during the protest said, “agar ham nahi awaaz uthaenge, toh kaun uthaiga? (If we don’t speak up, then who will?)”Photo: Zafar Habib. Another set of posters showcased how the youth view our prime minister and the education minister. Narendra Modi is shown as someone who only looks at himself and at the awards that he attributes to himself, as a rather narcissistic personality that does not engage with anyone else.Photo: Zafar Habib. Another banner demands Modi and Dharmendra Pradhan to stop hiding behind police enforcers. They are clearly seen as elected representatives that no longer represent or listen to the youth, instead choosing to use violence as their only form of engagement.Photo: Zafar Habib. At the same time, along with the beauty, there is brutality in these streets. The students who participated in the May 1968 protests were arrested and attacked by the French police. The news of police suppression quickly spread across France and led to daily demonstrations organised by students. The students, rather than being deterred by the police brutality, decided to strengthen their resolve and presence even further. They began to erect barricades from materials that they found nearby, breaking loose the road surface, transferring bricks to make walls, even overturning automobiles once the police violence began. Slowly, support from major trade unions, neighbours and local businesses started pouring in. On July 20, 2026, the CJP protesters also faced exactly this kind of violence. Citizens who were protesting peacefully were lathi-charged and tear-gassed, with reports of many cracked heads, bruised and bloodied bodies being left in the wake of this violence. Is it not ironic that a police SUV had the sticker “LIVE YOUNG, LIVE FREE” displayed on its rear window at the same time? I encountered a young protester, maybe around 17 years old, who had been lathi-charged along with his older brother. He was lost and could not find his sibling. We noticed quickly that he was covered in dirt and grime, his neck bruised purple and his arms dotted by bleeding cuts. Luckily, we had a first-aid kit on hand and were able to help him. He seemed genuinely confused as to why his government and the police would attack protesters who were voicing their dissent peacefully. When he tried to run away from the charge and fell, the police took it as an opportunity to simply beat him further. Nevertheless, he did not seem deterred by the violence he had faced. We cannot allow ourselves to be suppressed, we cannot allow even more voices in this country to be silenced into oblivion once again. Photo: Amber Habib. Ultimately, what the participants of the May 1968 movement recount the most is the transformative aspect of their active participation on the street. The slogans, the messages, the questioning of the established norms and systems and the collective dissent was something that never left them. This is what we too need to carry forward. The march itself and this particular movement must not be the end of our collective dissent. Growing up, we are all told about the limits and boundaries of the “real world” that we will soon face and how we must conform to it. However, is it not us who make up the ‘real world?’ The world is what we decide to make of it; it is what we demand of it and what we do within it. As we continue onwards in our movement and struggle, we must take forward this notion of dissent in every aspect of our lives. We must express it in our families, educational institutions, jobs and in our society. Only then will India become the country that we collectively dream of being one day. Zafar Habib is a B.A. (Research) History graduate from Shiv Nadar Institution of Eminence and will be joining the University of Oxford for a MPhil programme.