When Jayanti was released in 2021, it felt like something genuinely new in Indian cinema, particularly in the immediate aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic. The film received an unusually warm response, earning praise for its director and cast while generating considerable writing and discussion around it. Nearly five years later, director Shailesh Narwade returns with a sequel. We watched Jayanti 2 at its premiere, followed by a brief conversation with the cast.The film is cinematically assured. Watching it, one is struck by the fact that even in an age of heightened censorship, someone can still choose to say what they mean without flinching. During the post-screening discussion, Narwade shared with us that the film had been held up by the CBFC for several months and finally received its certificate only after 22 cuts. It was released on September 11.And yet, despite everything that has been trimmed from it, the film has lost none of its weight. If anything, the cuts sharpen the very question the film seems to be asking: the harder one tries to suppress an Ambedkarite cinematic voice, the more forcefully it will rise and make itself heard.It would not be an exaggeration to call Jayanti 2 a masterclass in representing caste discrimination within educational institutions, as well as in exploring questions of identity, whether Adivasi, gendered, linguistic or geographical. This makes the film particularly urgent at a moment when the “remove reservation” movement is once again gaining ground.The myths and misconceptions that dominant-caste society has long constructed around reservation, and more recently around the sub-categorisation of Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes, have been persistently challenged by Bahujan intellectuals through factual arguments. Jayanti 2 lays out these debates with remarkable sensitivity. The film also carries forward Kanshi Ram’s well-known socio-political principle that those whose population is greater should have a proportionately greater share, without ever allowing the argument to become merely didactic.This could easily serve as required viewing in educational institutions, particularly for building awareness and empathy. At one point, Payal Markam, the film’s Adivasi protagonist, says that although human beings live outside the forest, Manuski (humanity) still exists within it. It is a small line, but a powerful one. Narwade makes his case for equality and for the importance of reservation through concrete, practical examples, and manages to do so without ever losing the audience.Also read: A Historian Watches ‘RRR’: The Meaningless Anti-Colonialism of the Global BlockbusterWhat stands out most is one directorial choice. Unlike so many Indian films in which the wronged character suffers in silence for most of the runtime and rebels only in the final act, Narwade allows Payal to retaliate and confront her tormentors after only two or three humiliations. She does not have to endure the entire film before reclaiming her agency. This restraint reflects a conscious Ambedkarite gaze behind the camera.Payal is repeatedly taunted as a “quota” student, yet it is she who dismantles the myth of merit, achieving a remarkable breakthrough in agricultural research despite lacking the resources her critics take for granted. Rather than simply proving that a student admitted through reservation can also be “meritorious,” the film reverses the conventional merit/reservation binary itself.It asks us to consider who gets to define merit, what material conditions make merit possible, and why reservation is so often treated as the opposite of merit.A still from the ‘Jayanti 2’ trailer on YouTube.The film also turns its critical gaze to Economically Weaker Sections (EWS) reservation, refusing to leave the contradictions surrounding contemporary reservation discourse unexamined.The film further unmasks the informal, vigilante systems of justice that operate in the name of “preserving tradition”, embodied here by a student body called Parishad and by characters such as Pratap and the older Manohar Pant. In one of the film’s sharpest lines, Tanuja Shinde, a Dalit character, says: “I am not an animal, that’s my problem.”The line is a stark reminder of the humanity that Manuski demands us to recognise in one another. The solidarity that the film builds among Scheduled Caste, Scheduled Tribe and Other Backward Classes, as well as women, is genuinely moving.Another important layer that the film unveils is the idea of reparative justice. Cinema is often seen as a mirror of society. Experts have long recognised and described its potential for social influence. Yet, in a deeply stratified society, cinema can do more than just reflect social realities; it can contribute to reparative justice through cinematic communication and director Narwade demonstrates it in Jayanti 2.Also read: Dalit Consciousness and the Crisis of DemocracyAs explained above, the film’s significance lies in the way it enters the difficult terrain of caste reservation, social inequality and constitutional justice through a popular cinematic narrative. This film invites its audience to confront questions that continue to challenge the casteist mindsets in society, while making clear that it is not merely a story about an Adivasi girl.It raises fundamental questions about life and social justice: Who gets access to opportunities? Why does reservation remain so contested? What happens when historical injustice is forgotten? And, most importantly, what does justice mean in a society structured by centuries of graded inequality?Jayanti 2 has the ability to do something that the conventional academic discourse sometimes struggles to achieve: to make structural injustice emotionally and intellectually visible for viewers. Modern societies are often seen either denying the existence of caste or villainising caste-based reservation.At this point, this film opens an important pedagogical space for entering into the discourse through the classroom exercises depicted in the film. The lessons about what constitutes unfair competition presented by the professor with the demonstration of a hurdle race offers food for thought to the students in the film as well as to the spectators, who are encouraged to engage with related questions around caste identities.Instead of focusing on typical university culture, fashion, consumerism and competition, the film depicts deep interactions between professor and students, the principal and professor, students and student leaders, politicians and professors, and among students and professors within their peer groups. These interactions constantly invoke critical thinking. Further, reparative justice starts when the perpetrator acknowledges that historical injustice has been done and takes responsibility for moral repair.Jayanti 2 undertakes this work of moral repair with optimism. As academicians and pedagogues, we found the film deeply moving as a pedagogical intervention that enables audiences to reflect. Instead of limiting itself to being a film that engages caste and reservation debate, it turns the college into a space for learning about caste and identity. And it simultaneously pushes you to think about moral repair.A still from the ‘Jayanti 2’ trailer on YouTube.The new insight here is the pedagogical question: what happens to the viewer after witnessing injustice? Given that we have all watched many films on caste issues, does this film merely generate emotions or does it encourage reflection, critical questioning and a (re)thinking of one’s relationship with social inequality? Indeed it invites every section of society to participate in social change.Also read: K. Balagopal’s Incisive Essays on Caste, Communalism and Rise of State Authoritarianism in IndiaAs reparative justice begins with recognition, Jayanti 2 creates the possibility of recognising the historical harm, beginning with its acknowledgement by the perpetrators.The tension between generational privilege and generational harm is explored with the intention of enabling repair rather than reproducing damage. Hence, Jayanti 2 demonstrates the potential of cinema as a pedagogy of reparative justice.Additionally, following Babasaheb Ambedkar’s words, ‘Educate, Agitate, Organise’, the film emphasises collective responsibility. Dr. Ambedkar’s transformative pedagogical philosophy has resonance in the film. It speaks to how social change becomes possible when people are stop being passive observers and begin taking collective responsibility. Payal Markam’s story does this for the rest of the students to follow the process of ‘Educate, Agitate, Organise’.The male lead Santya (played by Ruturaj Wankhede), is presented as a leader who is seen following the path constructed with these three principles of Babasaheb’s philosophy. He starts empathising with Payal Markam’s struggle when Tanuja introduces him to the discourse of caste and he begins to educate himself about caste.The more he understands the historical injustice of caste, the more he spreads awareness, mobilises people to understand it, and finally organise them to bring reason to the debates. By the end, the whole college becomes capable of recognising injustice and acting against it. Jayanti 2 invites us to a cinematic masterclass in constitutional morality and a medium for reparative justice.At the end, Jayanti 2 argues that the state and society can deliver equality to marginalised communities only when justice is pursued with sincere intent. The film’s idea of justice with intention becomes central to its politics: legal and institutional mechanisms alone cannot produce equality unless there is a genuine willingness to make them work for those for whom they were created.The music contributes significantly to this politics as well, deepening the emotional register while also moving the narrative forward. The performances are equally strong, with every actor inhabiting their role fully and convincingly.Jayanti 2 is a film that deserves to be watched, particularly by those from oppressor-caste communities. It does not cultivate hatred towards anyone. Instead, it asks viewers to understand why mechanisms of social justice such as reservation were designed in the first place, and why they continue to matter.And perhaps that is where the film leaves us: with a quiet sense of hope. Change, Jayanti 2 suggests, is possible when it emerges from sincere intent, as we see in the transformations of Pratap and Arya Wagh. Justice, in the film’s world, is not merely about having the right institutions. It is also about possessing Manuski and the intention to make those institutions just.Dr Neeraj Bunkar is a researcher specialising in caste and cinema. Dr Madhu B. Baghel is a sociologist and works as an assistant professor.