Since the 1990s, Telangana has been witnessing a noteworthy trend in politics where ‘victims of discrimination and official apathy’ have been contesting elections to advocate for their causes. In the 2023 Assembly elections, Karne Shireesha, also known as Barrelakka, a graduate-turned-dairy farmer, gained prominence by challenging bigwigs in the Kollapur Assembly constituency, focusing on the issue of unemployment and garnering support from civil society.
The upcoming general elections in the Hyderabad parliamentary constituency will witness another such candidate, not vying for victory but seeking to shed light on alleged caste discrimination. Dr. J Padmaja, awarded a doctorate in Chemistry by Osmania University in 2013, contends she has been unable to secure employment in her department at the university due to purported caste bias and persecution.
She has joined Viduthalai Chiruthaigal Katchi (VCK), formerly Dalit Panthers of India, a political party based in Tamil Nadu, and is expected to get a ticket by the party on April 16 to contest from the Hyderabad Lok Sabha segment.
She has been protesting on the pavement of a parking lot in front of NCC Gate at OU campus for the past 130 days, seeking justice for all that she endured. Come rain or merciless summer heat, she stands there with a flexi behind her, informing the onlookers how she was allegedly harassed and humiliated by “a few powerful men who believe in an ideology of discrimination”.
She alleges that the then vice-chancellor, president of OU Teachers Association, and a few professors in her department had tried their best to prevent her from receiving her doctorate in 2013. She also alleges sexual harassment and caste discrimination and being falsely implicated in a criminal case, which she fought and was acquitted last year.
“I have been applying for guest faculty jobs at various OU-affiliated colleges after every notifications. But the authorities don’t even consider my candidature,” she tells Siasat.com.
“I was informed by some people that my applications always end up in dustbin. Even last year during recruitment of guest faculty for Nizam College and district PG colleges under OU, after I qualified the written test and was interviewed, I wasn’t hired despite being the only SC woman PhD awardee in the department. I was told by the professors that they would select me only if the former vice-chancellor gave permission,” she alleges.
She claims that her struggle has exacted a personal toll. Having lost her father and sister, and enduring separation from her husband, she currently resides with her mother, pursues a law programme while steadfastly protesting at the NCC Gate.
Now in her forties, Dr Padmaja seeks only the opportunity to advocate for the aspirations of young job-seekers in Telangana. “On one hand, they chant slogans of ‘beti bachao, beti padhao,’ yet this is the injustice they perpetrate against a Dalit woman,” she says.
When asked about the possibility of her candidacy indirectly benefiting her adversaries by splitting the anti-BJP vote, she told Siasat.com that contesting is her right. “I believe this is the avenue through which I can address the challenges confronting the youth. I have tried many things in the past, now I will utilise political and democratic channels.”
Expressing dissent by nomination
In 2019 Assembly elections, 25 turmeric farmers from Nizamabad in Telangana, had filed their nominations for contesting against Prime Minister Narendra Modi from Varanasi, but the Election Commission rejected the nominations of 24 farmers.
A similar thing developmemt took place in Telangana during the same elections. As many as 47 farmers filed their nominations to contest from Nizamabad Lok Sabha seat, from where BRS MLC K Kavitha was contesting. She lost that election to BJP candidate Dharmapuri Arvind.
In the 1996 Lok Sabha elections, environmental and social activist Dusharla Satyanarayana had convinced 480 farmers from Nalgonda region to file nominations, just to highlight the water woes in the fluoride-hit villages of the region. That move had shaken the then NDA government, which invited him and farmers to meet then prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee.
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