How do states realize social reforms for marginalized groups in settings of entrenched inequality? This article argues that reform implementation is a conflict-ridden process driven by the institutional activism of street-level bureaucrats. Through an ethnographic case study of Mahila Samkhya, a novel government program for women's empowerment in Uttar Pradesh, India, I find that local fieldworkers committed to reform promoted girls' education by mobilizing marginalized citizens and mediating local conflicts.