Caste-based discrimination persists as a formidable barrier within Indian higher education, compelling Dalit students to employ university spaces not only for learning but as arenas for activism and social change. This dissertation explores the agency of Dalit students as they confront and dismantle systemic inequalities through strategic…

Food insecurity is a global concern and is acute in South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa as well as pockets in the global North. In the lush green spaces of "God's Own Country", the state of Kerala in India, about 379,000 women are engaged in farming in about 75,800 groups. Spearheaded by Kudumbashree, the State Poverty Eradication Mission…

This dissertation is an attempt to understand the meta-narratives of justice operating within the "Trailokya Bauddha Mahasangha, Sahayak Gana" (TBMSG), a dalit Buddhist social movement active in Maharashtra, India. The movement, a vestige of Dr. B.R. Ambedkar's 1956 conversion to Buddhism, is actively fighting for dalits rights by…