New Delhi, Oct. 28 -- When the Bollywood film Dhadak 2 released earlier this year, its portrayal of caste discrimination in Indian campuses reignited an uncomfortable question-have our universities truly become equal spaces? The timing was striking: September 2025, caste-based reservation again sparked protests across India: Scheduled Caste students in Uttar Pradesh demonstrated against an alleged quota for non-SC/ST students in government hostels, while in Delhi, the Students' Federation of India (SFI) staged marches at Delhi University demanding full implementation of reservation in postgraduate courses and hostels.

These flashpoints reveal that the debate over reservation in education-long considered a settled moral imperative, remain...