Wangchuk frail; Delhi HC orders monitoring

SOCIAL – UNREST

17 JULY 2026

• With activist Sonam Wangchuk’s health condition worsening on the 19th day of his indefinite hunger strike at Jantar Mantar, the Delhi High Court ordered the Union and Delhi governments to ensure regular monitoring of his health.
• Doctors warned that Mr. Wangchuk’s health condition had entered a critical stage.
• He has lost over 9 kg, but remains “mentally alert”. He now weighs 56.9 kg.
• The Delhi High Court ordered that Mr. Wangchuk be “regularly medically checked up by government doctors.”
• A Bench of Chief Justice Devendra Kumar Upadhyaya and Justice Tejas Karia asked Solicitor-General Tushar Mehta whether any mechanism was in place to monitor Mr. Wangchuk’s health.
• Mr. Mehta submitted that Mr. Wangchuk undergoes a daily health check-up.
• The Division Bench passed the direction while hearing a public interest litigation (PIL) petition filed by advocate and activist Rakesh Kumar Saini.
• Mr. Saini sought intervention “even if forcibly” to save Mr. Wangchuk’s life.
• Mr. Wangchuk has been on a hunger strike demanding Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan’s resignation over issues concerning the country’s education system.
• The Cockroach Janta Party (CJP)’s protest site filled up substantially as more high-profile figures arrived at Jantar Mantar to register their support.
• Three student supporters from the Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist)’s student outfit, the All India Students’ Association (AISA), were also at a critical stage of their concurrent hunger strike, Sai Balaji, a former AISA president, said in a statement.
• While there have been calls for Mr. Wangchuk to end his hunger strike, he remained resolute, saying calling off his fast without any response from the government would send a wrong message. Instead, he urged people to strengthen the CJP’s proposed Parliament march on July 20.

Sonam Wangchuk

• Sonam Wangchuk (born September 1, 1966) is an Indian engineer, innovator, and climate and education activist from Ladakh.
• He is the founding-director of SECMOL (Students’ Educational and Cultural Movement of Ladakh) and is widely known as the inspiration for the lead character Phunsukh Wangdu in the 2009 Bollywood film 3 Idiots. 
• He launched “Operation New Hope” in 1994 to reform the government school system in Ladakh.
• In 1998, he opened the SECMOL Alternative School, which focuses on life skills and practical learning for students who struggled in traditional systems. 
• He designed the SECMOL campus, which utilizes passive solar energy and runs entirely without fossil fuels for heating or lighting. 
• To combat climate change and mountain water scarcity, he invented the Ice Stupa technique, which freezes and stores winter streams into giant cone-shaped artificial glaciers that slowly melt to provide water for spring farming.
• He is a vocal advocate for environmental preservation and the implementation of the Sixth Schedule in Ladakh, regularly leading public demonstrations.
• For his outstanding contributions to education and sustainability, he was awarded the prestigious Ramon Magsaysay Award in 2018. It is also called Asia’s Nobel Prize.