A Delhi Student Was Doxxed And Detained For A Women’s Safety WhatsApp Group

On the morning of October 9, when Vijeyta Rajbhar created a WhatsApp group called “Women for Jantar Mantar”, she thought she was solving a logistics problem. Around 45 metro stations were expected to shut ahead of the next day’s protest. Roads across the capital would be blocked. The group was meant to help Delhi’s female students find each other, travel together and get to the protest safely.

By evening, screenshots from the group were circulating on social media. The PhD student had been branded a “Marxist goon” on X. Television news channels, News18 and Republic, were airing packages reading out the group’s messages as evidence of a conspiracy.

Vijeyta’s phone number, along with those of dozens of other women in the group, was now public. The rape threats and abusive calls started soon.

She spent the night fielding panicked messages from younger students and receiving warnings, on her private chats, that Delhi Police knew the group members’ whereabouts. She went to bed at around 6 am at her home in Burari.

At 7 am, Delhi Police were at her door to detain her “following official orders”.

A safety group became a ‘terror plot’

The October 10 protest was the Cockroach Janta Party’s “Jantar Mantar 2.0”, a call for Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar to resign over alleged irregularities in the Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls. CJP founder Abhijeet Dipke had announced the mobilisation after a massive gathering at Mumbai’s Shivaji Park on October 2. Delhi police denied permission.

The Home Ministry sent in 23,000 central armed police personnel to the capital, some pulled from counter-insurgency duty in Chhattisgarh and Kashmir. The deployment matched the security during the G20 summit.

The “terror” framing of the Jantar Mantar protests was already in circulation. In August, the West Bengal STF had alleged that a Jaish-e-Mohammed operative planned to infiltrate an earlier CJP protest at the same site.

But “Women for Jantar Mantar” had nothing to do with any of that. It grew out of a different strand of organising altogether.

On September 21, a 17-year-old girl had been gang-raped at Aastha Kunj Park near Kalkaji Mandir by three men who posed as police officers. The assault near one of south Delhi’s most visited temples set off weeks of protests.

Students from Lady Shri Ram College, Miranda House, Gargi College and other DU institutions held solidarity marches and midnight walks under banners like “Reclaim the Night,” demanding safer public spaces, better lighting, functional complaint committees and an end to the idea that women’s safety meant women staying indoors. A web of WhatsApp groups had sprung up to coordinate these efforts.

Vijeyta, a member of Pachhas (Parivartankami Chhatra Sangathan), a student organisation active in DU’s South Campus, shared the new group’s invitation link in these existing night-walk groups. “Women for Jantar Mantar” was an extension of the same infrastructure: women organising to keep each other safe on the way to a protest.

A few hours in, the group had swelled to between 250 and 300 members. Women from across Delhi-NCR were discussing where to meet and how to travel. Then a member shared a video of Abhishek Thakur, a self-styled Hindutva influencer, warning people against attending the protest.

The conversation shifted. One member jokingly suggested wearing saffron scarves, applying a tilak or tying a kalawa — a sacred thread worn on the wrist. Another suggested keeping red or orange paint handy for those who couldn’t arrange these items.

“It was all sarcastic. We were exchanging laughing emojis about it,” said Vijeyta.

Buried in the scroll of messages, a line appeared: “Full Kasab Energy,” invoking Ajmal Kasab, the Pakistani terrorist convicted in the 2008 Mumbai attacks.

“Since a lot of messages were coming in, nobody noticed that particular one in between,” the PhD scholar told Decode.

The women later noticed that the message had been sent from a number saved as ‘Lucky’ on WhatsApp. Further checks on Truecaller showed the number was registered to Lucky Dhaulpure in Madhya Pradesh.

The women Decode spoke to tried calling the number but received no response. When Vijeyta confronted the sender in a private chat, he dismissed the message “as a joke”.

“I told him that if it was sent as a joke, he should at least clarify things for those who had already tagged us terrorists,” Vijeyta said. No further messages followed. The sender did not respond to further attempts to contact him and had blocked those who reached out.

What nobody in the group had registered was about to become the entire story told about them.

From private chat to public target

The first signs came as threatening private messages and calls warning the women against attending the protest.

On realising that the group meant for female students had been infiltrated by anonymous users who were not interested in either the protests or safety, the admins started weeding out accounts with no display pictures or names. “We removed around 30 to 40 numbers with no display picture or names and changed the settings to allow only admins to admit new members,” said Manisha, a third-year political science student at Daulat Ram College and a group admin.

But the screenshots had already been taken.

At 8:20 pm, an X account called “Office of Vijay Patel” posted a warning claiming that WhatsApp groups showed “Marxists are planning a war in India in Kasab style.” About 20 minutes later, it shared screenshots from the group. The admins’ phone numbers appeared to have been blurred, but remained visible to a good extent. A separate screenshot showed Vijeyta’s Instagram account, captioned, “Marxist goon Vijeyta Rajbhar is the admin of this WhatsApp group.”

The X account, which has over 82K followers, describes itself as managed by Vijay Patel’s office. Patel, also known as Vijay Gajera, founded the fact-checking platform Only Fact India. The account regularly targets opposition figures, activists and journalists with allegations linking them to “foreign-funded” or “Marxist-Islamist” networks.

The screenshots highlighted the exchange about saffron scarves, tilak, kalawa and orange paint alongside the “Full Kasab Energy” message. The preceding conversation, one that made clear the women were joking about precautions against potential attackers, was missing.

Each layer of amplification stripped more context and added more threat. Comments under the post argued that the numbers should not have been blurred at all. Other accounts shared screenshots with the numbers plainly visible.

Some accounts tried to blur the numbers, but most left them visible. (Original screenshots; AI-generated collage)

An account using the name “Batman” shared a private conversation in which its user had messaged Vijeyta asking to join her at the protest. When she asked how he had obtained her number, he replied, “I got it from X.” The account captioned the exchange: “Lmao she got scared.”

Another account, “Ravi Bishnoi,” posted a screenshot of an SMS-bombing webpage with numbers from the group entered into it.

Other accounts tagged Delhi Police and the Union Home Ministry, urging authorities to “kill the terrorists” who supposedly planned to “defame Hindutva.”

Decode found at least 20 accounts circulating the screenshots to advance the same narrative, including accounts with substantial followings: Jaipur Dialogues, Megh Updates, Hindutva Knight, Mr Sinha and The Story Teller.

Senior advocate Mahesh Jethmalani and CNN-News18 anchor Rahul Shivshankar also shared the screenshots. Jethmalani’s post showed the group members’ phone numbers clearly, while Shivshankar blurred the numbers and credited CNN-News18 Executive Editor Shawan Sen for the screenshots.

The comments beneath the posts included rape threats, misogynistic abuse and references to Umar Khalid, with users wishing similar fates on the women.

Jaipur Dialogues had previously shared personal details of Ruchika, a 15-year-old seen abusing Prime Minister Narendra Modi during the July protests. The exposure led to the minor being hounded online and having to change accommodation three times with her single mother.

The narrative moved from X to television the same night. News18 and Republic aired packages on the group, reading out its messages as evidence of a supposed conspiracy.

Decode has reached out to the X accounts and news channels asking if they verified the screenshots before running it on their platform. The story will be updated if and when they respond.

Both channels repeatedly circulated a message containing a checklist advising women to carry stun guns, pepper spray, water bottles, glucose packets and power banks, wear knee and elbow pads and take precautions against potential attackers.

That message, Decode later learned, had been sent by Vini, an activist working on environmental and women’s issues. She told Decode the screenshots had cut it off at the “Read more” fold.

“Later, I had also mentioned what to do when you are on your periods. But that didn’t suit the agenda of these gangsters,” she said, referring to the bad actors who had joined the group.

 Screenshot of Vini's full message (AI-enhanced representation)

Manisha, DU student and admin, said neither news channels had contacted the women before airing their private messages.

“They made it seem as though there had been some big terrorism bust. They did not even bother to call any of us and confirm, just propagated the narrative started on X,” she said.

The phones that wouldn't stop ringing

While the story was being constructed online and on television, the women in the group were living its consequences in real time.

Women began receiving incessant abusive calls and messages, while also calling each other in panic, asking what to do. Several girls from the group began dropping out citing safety concerns. Some switched off their mobile, others uninstalled WhatsApp.

‘I’ll show you full Kasab energy’, ‘Umar Khalid needs a cell mate’, ‘Do remember, one FIR and your dream of foreign visa will be dead for life’, ‘Your entire terrorist gang isn’t safe’, were some of the messages seen by Decode. Others included death and rape threats.

For Manisha, the threats reached her family in Faridabad. She received WhatsApp calls until around 2 am. Her mother, who had the SIM card associated with the number, continued receiving calls until the next morning. The number was registered in her father’s name. The family received calls from people who appeared to have obtained his name, their home address and an alternate contact number.

“I told them not to answer calls from unknown numbers. I was worried about their safety as well as my own, since I live alone,” Manisha said.

The harassment also took forms that suggested something more coordinated than individual trolling. Group members received repeated OTPs from Magicbricks, Flipkart and Myntra — services they had not registered with. They could not establish whether the messages were automated or whether their numbers had been entered into the platforms individually.

Vini received a message citing the registration number of her two-wheeler, which had remained parked at home. The message was sent from a private number registered to Juletha Kerketta in Odisha. It was clearly fabricated, but it correctly identified Vini’s vehicle.

Someone had her vehicle’s registration details.

Vini received the challan message from a personal number. (AI-enhanced representation)

When Surveillance Came Knocking

The night before the October 10 protest, amid all the chaos, Vijeyta had posted an Instagram reel in which she said, “This fascist government is scared of a 300 member WhatsApp group. We want to let you know that we won’t budge.” The video has since received more than 8 lakh views.

That night, Vijeyta was also reassuring younger students in a WhatsApp group even as she began receiving personal and family details of other members in her private chats. The next morning, at around 7 am, she was picked up from her home in Burari without being shown an order or told why she was being detained.

Vijeyta told Decode that no women police personnel were present when officers arrived at her home in plain clothes.

“My partner, who lives with me, tried to record them taking me away on my mobile phone as evidence. The personnel snatched the phone and deleted the video,” she said.

Vijeyta repeatedly asked the officers to show her the order authorising her detention. They did not respond, she said, telling her only that they had been instructed to take her away. She was taken to the local police station along with a Cockroach Janata Party volunteer and a labour rights activist, unrelated to each other.

At the police station, officers recorded her personal and family details and photographed her. She and the two men were then taken to Rajiv Gandhi Stadium in Bawana, more than 20 kilometres away.

“Till about 3 pm, I was the only girl among 15 boys who had also been picked up in the morning as part of the broader crackdown."

There was no food, and the only available water was unclean. With mobile internet not working, ordering food online was not an option. As detainees began protesting over the lack of food, an IPS officer arrived and assured the men that food would be provided. “But he did not even bother to look at me as I was sitting there alone in the corner,” Vijeyta said.

More detainees arrived throughout the day. Some were limping, others were bleeding, she recalled, but no one was given medical assistance. Lawyers were also absent.

Around 3 pm, several Communist Party of India (Marxist) leaders were brought to the stadium. Police then distributed samosas and bottled water, but the quantity was insufficient, Vijeyta said.

At around 5 pm, the women were asked to queue up to leave. They refused to go unless everyone else was released too. After arguments with the police, all were let go at around 5.30 pm. By now the number of the detainees had easily crossed 250.

On October 10, Vijeyta was detained before she could reach the protest site. The police gave her no reason. She is certain it was the screenshots and the story that had been built around them overnight. The harassment that followed, she said, was tied to that WhatsApp group.

Decode has reached out to Delhi Police for clarification on the reasons for Vijeyta’s detention and whether it was connected to the WhatsApp group. The story will be updated if a response is received.

The WhatsApp group still exists

Vini, who has been a women's rights activist for more than a decade, said the scale of the harassment and surveillance had shaken her. “I have been educating women about safety and their rights, especially in unprecedented situations. The scale this time was shocking to my core,” she said.

Some of the women were first-year college students from financially precarious backgrounds. Vini feared that the fallout could extend to their education and independence.

“For some of them, all this could mean dropping out of college and being forced to get married,” she said.

The women suspect that some participants joined the group to expose its contents, but who coordinated the subsequent circulation of screenshots remains unclear.

The group remains active. Around 100 women are still in it, Vijeyta said, though she has told them they are free to leave if they feel unsafe. The women are in touch with a lawyer and are planning to file action against the accounts who spread their numbers.

Some of the women who joined “Women for Jantar Mantar” were trying to figure out which metro station to meet at. Others wanted to know if they should carry water or a power bank. The group was built around the most ordinary kind of solidarity. It became, instead, the means through which they were identified, exposed and followed home.

“We have all been so disturbed, and are still trying to wrap our heads around how this level of surveillance and harassment could have happened,” Vini said.