[3] Nagaraj was schooled in his hometown, after which he studied at the Government Arts and Science College, Bangalore.

[4] Nagaraj rose through the ranks at the Bangalore University, quickly becoming a Reader, and then just before his death in 1998 he was named for the newly established Kailasam Chair.

In addition to his primary affiliation with the Kannada Department of Bangalore University, Nagaraj was a fellow at the Indian Institute of Advanced Study, Shimla (1993–4); Senior Fellow at the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS, Delhi (1994–6); and visiting professor in the Department of South Asian Languages and Civilizations at the University of Chicago (1997 and 1998).

Flaming Feet is his collection of essays on the Indian Dalit movement whose title article "Flaming Feet" discusses the varied philosophies of Mahatma Gandhi and B. R. Ambedkar on Dalit emancipation and tries to find an underlying unity.

A revised and extended version of this book was posthumously published as The Flaming Feet and Other Essays: The Dalit Movement in India in 2011.

In the months preceding his death, he was "probing the nature of feminism as a frame for a new dalit literary criticism.

Dr. Nagaraj published his first book, Amruta mattu Garuda (Nectar and the Eagle) in 1983 and the second book, his PhD thesis on modern Kannada poetry and poetics, Shakti Sharadeya Mela (The Festival of Shakti and Sharade) shortly thereafter.