YouTuber Dhruv Rathee Claims He Was ‘Kidnapped’ After Police Release

On Sunday, a visibly shaken Dhruv Rathee uploaded a short video to X, insisting that what happened to him was not a routine arrest but a outright kidnapping. He said a gang of roughly twenty men in plain clothes burst into his Gurugram home early Saturday morning, pulled him out of bed and whisked him away.

According to Rathee, the drama started around 7 a.m. when his mother opened the door after hearing a commotion outside. Instead of uniformed officers, she supposedly saw men without any identification, who then shoved her back and entered the house. "They pushed my mother, dragged me from my bedroom, and I ended up with bruises all over my body," he narrated, pointing to the fresh wounds on his arms.

He added that the men forced him down a flight of stairs, leaving him sore and unable to move comfortably. While he was being taken away, Rathee claims his parents were also beaten, something he says he could not verify because he was too hurt to look around.

Police later released him late that night, handing him back to his family. In the same video, he flashed his Indian passport, rejecting the authorities' earlier claim that he was a foreign national trying to join the protest. "I am an Indian citizen with the same rights as any other citizen," he asserted, his voice wavering slightly.

The whole episode unfolded just hours before the Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) planned a protest at Delhi’s Jantar Mantar against Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar. Security forces had already been on high alert, detaining more than 7,000 people across the capital to prevent the rally. Rathee’s detention, he says, was a pre‑emptive move to stop him from participating.

Beyond the personal ordeal, Rathee used the platform to launch a broader criticism. He described the incident as an "unofficial emergency" and accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi of steering the country toward a dictatorship. "If this can happen to me, it can happen to any ordinary citizen," he warned, urging his followers to stay vigilant.

He also thanked activist Sonam Wangchuk for threatening a hunger strike until those detained were set free. "I will keep raising my voice for the country, no matter how much they try to suppress us," Rathee concluded, ending with a resolute "Jai Hind."