He writes columns for The Indian Express and The Open Magazine. He has authored two books about decoloniality in relation to India: India That Is Bharat (2021) and India, Bharat and Pakistan (2022) with two mores books to come covering the era of partition.
Deepak has been part of Basmati Geographical Indication litigation, as the Special Counsel for the State Govt of Madhya Pradesh, seeking inclusion of MP as part of the Basmati Geographical Indication. [7]
Deepak argued the case for the entry of women to Sabarimala Temple. He argued against the entry, stating that the Hindu deity Ayyappan observes naishtika brahmacharya ("lifelong celibacy").[8] He was also a counsel in a petition to allow priests of any caste to be priests at Sabarimala, the priesthood at the temple has historically been open to only Malayali Brahmins.[9] The Kerala High Court ruled in favor of the traditional practices.
J. Sai Deepak with Assamese theatre actor Dulal Roy and Assamese Writer-novelist Dr. Dhrubajyoti Bora in an event during Assam Book Fair 2023, Guwahati.
Deepak is a Hindutva activist. He believes that the several good qualities of the knowledge systems of ancient Hindu civilization, mixed with the good qualities of modern education systems, can be a template for modern Indian education systems, which he considers to have multiple drawbacks.[16][17] He opposes the Dravidian movement and Periyarite thought, and claims they are Western interventions in Southern Indian societal faultlines.[18] He has written an article, where he discussed limitations imposed by the Indian Constitution against Hindu majoritarian expression. He had criticized the provisions for Hindu majority authority being subject to judicial review and being overruled if it conflicts with constitutional morality.[16]
Deepak's talks on the Karnataka hijab ban at St. Stephen's College, and on minority rights at Jamia Millia Islamia respectively, were cancelled despite receiving permission in what was termed by some journalists as the advent of cancel culture and deplatforming in India.[19] Deepak's talk on the Uniform Civil Code in Bengaluru at a Karnataka Bar Association event was faced with opposition from a group of lawyers who wanted the event to be cancelled in an attempted case of deplatforming, but it wasn't.[20]
Deepak has participated in multiple debates, the prominent ones being with Saurabh Kirpal on same sex marriage;[21] with S. Y. Quraishi and Manish Tewari on the Uniform Civil Code;[22] with Shashi Tharoor on decoloniality;[23] and with AG Krishna Menon and Sanjay Nirupam on nationalism.[24] Deepak is also a frequent orator, having spoken at multiple universities, as well as at literature and cultural festivals.[25]
Jacobsen, Knut A. (2023). "International Networks Supporting Hindutva". In Chopra, Rohit (ed.). Routledge Handbook of Contemporary India. Abingdon, Oxon New York, NY: Routledge. p.222. doi:10.4324/9781003278436. ISBN978-1-003-27843-6. Hindutva ideologues, like J. Sai Deepak, have also found mainstream English-language publishers like Bloomsbury India and Penguin Books India much more amenable to publishing their work, which more often than not substitutes crudely nationalist historical and social perspectives for scholarly quality
Hew, Wai Weng; Chan, Nicholas (2024). "Idealized Past, Exclusivist Present: Right-wing Appropriation of the Decolonial Rhetoric in Malaysia". Critical Asian Studies. 56 (4): 625–651. doi:10.1080/14672715.2024.2400219. ISSN1467-2715. Walter Mignolo, had to apologize on Facebook after he endorsed a book written by Sai Deepak, a Hindu supremacist who used decolonial frameworks to legitimize problematic Hindutva ideas.
Hull, George (4 May 2023). "Varieties of intellectual decolonisation: an introduction". Social Dynamics. 49 (2): 185–195. doi:10.1080/02533952.2023.2243077. ISSN0253-3952. Sai Deepak – who is, like Ram Swarup, a prominent voice in the Hindutva current of thought and political activism}}
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