At JNU, in 1982, he undertook an indefinite hunger strike in protest against caste discrimination. When the movement transformed into a broader struggle he made use of the May 1968 Sorbonne student revolution in France. His activism came at a personal cost. His political defiance resulted in institutional rustication. Yet the confrontation ultimately became part of a larger struggle for institutional change and reforms intended to benefit marginalized Dalit communities
The video above represents his ongoing struggle for civil rights, and social justice beyond the university and into the streets of NYC. Starting with Forsythe March in Georgia to the Black Lives Matter in this country, he raised his voice against injustice everywhere.
Rao is probably the first or the only Indian that helped Native Americans living on the Reservation and appearing before a Native American tribunal of the Seneca Nation of Indians in Upstate New York. Using his international and indigenous legal strategies, he formulated media and political strategies challenging the casino gambling on that Indian reservation and successfully blocked the proposed gambling operation on the Reservation without any remuneration. The only remuneration was they adopted him.
For him the struggle never stops and some of the following media clippings add to that.