The Indian government has ordered telecom companies to disable mobile data services in central parts of the capital Delhi, in and around the site of youth protests seeking the resignation of the education minister, two sources told Reuters on Thursday.
The companies have complied with the order, Reuters sources said.
There was no mobile data connectivity in many parts of central Delhi on Thursday evening, Reuters journalists said.
Vendors, shopkeepers and restaurants complained that they were unable to accept digital payments.
India’s youth protesters have called for nationwide demonstrations on Friday even as Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government urged them to join talks, while shutting metro stations and mobile internet services and curtailing business in central Delhi.
The youth protesters, led by the self-named "Cockroach" Janta Party movement, have been camping in central Delhi since last month and are demanding the resignation of the education minister over leaks of medical school entrance test papers that affected some 2 million students in May and have been linked to several student suicides.
The protests have swelled into the biggest youth challenge to Modi since he came to power in 2014. Opposition parties have echoed the youth movement's demands and have disrupted the monsoon session of parliament that began this week.
It marks the biggest political crisis of Modi's third term, which began in 2024.
The government made a fresh appeal on Thursday to the protesters to join talks to resolve the crisis but they responded by calling for nationwide peaceful protests on Friday in solidarity with students who alleged police brutality during a marc
