My research lies at the intersection of social anthropology, political sociology, and higher education studies. I examine how caste, inequality, belonging, and institutional power shape students’ everyday experiences within universities. My current doctoral research focuses on study circles, collective reading, knowledge production, student politics, and everyday resistance in Indian higher education. Methodologically, I primarily work with ethnography, participant observation, in-depth interviews, narrative analysis, qualitative coding, and archival and documentary research.
Social Anthropology
Anthropology of Education
Political Sociology
Higher Education Studies
South Asian Studies
Caste and Social Inequality
Caste, marginality, and social inequality in higher education
Study circles, collective reading, and knowledge production
Student movements and campus politics
Belonging, exclusion, and institutional life
Critical pedagogy and educational resistance
Academic freedom, censorship, and authoritarianism
Marginalised students’ experiences and aspirations
Space, identity, and everyday life in universities
Decolonisation and social justice in higher education
Cinema and everyday social constellations
Ethnographic fieldwork
Participant observation
In-depth and semi-structured interviews
Narrative inquiry and narrative analysis
Grounded theory
Qualitative data analysis and coding
Archival and documentary research
Spatial and institutional analysis
Digital ethnography
My current research project examines study circles as emerging spaces of resistance in Indian universities. I explore how Left and Ambedkarite study circles use collective reading and discussion to respond to caste inequality, political repression, restrictions on academic freedom, and everyday censorship. The research focuses on how collective reading creates a sense of belonging and becomes an embodied, ritualised form of everyday resistance, distinct from conventional student protest.
April 2023 – March 2026
Bielefeld University, Bielefeld, Germany
Project: Navigating Universities: Student Aspirations, Boundaries, and Transformations in India and the Philippines, funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG)
Project Lead: Prof. Dr. Joanna Pfaff-Czarnecka
Responsibilities: Ethnographic fieldwork, literature review, qualitative data analysis, workshop organisation, academic writing, collaborative research, and project dissemination.
April 2022 – June 2022
Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi, India
Project: State-level Universities and Unpacking their Role, with a Specific Focus on Policy-making and Broader Social Justice
Project Lead: Dr. Priyadarshini Singh
February 2024 – April 2025
New Delhi, India
Conducted ethnographic fieldwork at a premier public university in Delhi as part of a project funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG).
Project: Navigating Universities: Student Aspirations, Boundaries, and Transformations in India and the Philippines
Project Lead: Prof. Dr. Joanna Pfaff-Czarnecka, Bielefeld University
January 2022 – March 2022
Bengaluru, India
Worked on an independent research project at the Indian Institute for Human Settlements (IIHS), Bengaluru, as part of the Urban Fellows Programme. The project examined how spatial belonging shapes the everyday learning experiences of urban fellows from marginal spaces at IIHS.
Project: Space, Belonging and Everyday Learning Experiences: A Case Study of Indian Institute for Human Settlements (IIHS)
Project Supervisor: Dr. Gautam Bhan, IIHS
January 2020 – April 2020
New Delhi, India
Conducted fieldwork in three peripheral localities of Delhi as part of the Master of Philosophy (MPhil) Program in Political Science at University of Delhi. The study examined the everyday experience of caste-based spatial exclusion faced by marginalised communities (particularly Scheduled Castes) residing in segregated settlements.
Supervisor: Prof. Dr. N. Sukumar
March 2017
Gwalior, India
Conducted a field survey with project team members in Gwalior, Madhya Pradesh, as part of the course “Methods in Social Sciences” at the Centre for Political Studies, School of Social Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi.
Project: The Persistence of Gender Inequality in the Tribal Societies of Central India
Field Supervisors: Dr. Harish Wankhede & Dr. Sudhir Kumar Suthar, Jawaharlal Nehru University