Tag: Alumnus

The Indian general election is a year away, but the country’s already in the grip of multiple state-level polls. The BAP’s members, many belonging to the SC, ST, and OBC communities, have even quit their white-collar jobs. Led by Naveen Kumar, a 2015 graduate of IIT-Delhi, the party embarked this week on a social media campaign, with posters carrying images of iconic social reformer Bhimrao Ambedkar and former president APJ Abdul Kalam, among others. This isn’t the first time that IIT graduates have given politics a shot. Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal, who founded the Aam Aadmi Party, was a student of IIT Kharagpur. The IITs are among the hardest universities to get into in India, given the rigorous selection process, and there are reservation policies in place for students from the SC, ST, and OBC communities. And what sets the BAP apart is its focus on caste discrimination, which, the members argue, remains the norm in India. Especially so in education and employment and despite the quota policy designed to uplift the country’s oppressed communities. “Existing parties are using deprived masses as a vote bank,” he told the Economic Times newspaper on April 24. Informed by their own experiences of injustice while growing up, studying, and working, the BAP members’ goal is to end caste discrimination and ensure dignity for the SC, ST, and OBC communities.